[citicroego]

My starting point I suppose is that we are all contributing to the support of sin in ways that often we are not aware of....I think we see now that this involves all of us and compromises all of us in various ways; that it leaves none of us entirely innocent if that is what we suppose we can achieve. When I was in college we got involved in this move that attempted to boycot any company that actively supported abortion or other morally objectionable actions. Needless to say this did not last long as one quickly came to realize that you really would have to run off into the bush and not buy anything from anyone. I appreciate the reminder though that we can't just shrug the situation off and proclaim our own innocence due to the fact that our cooperation is passive. There does have to be a recognition of our own complicity and the taint therefrom.

But because human action allows something else besides a straight forward abetting or encouragement of others to sin. There seems to be two questions we are circling around here. One is the question of keeping ourselves morally pure while living in the world. The other related question regards our responsibility to our society as a Christian.

In thinking of the second question the thought that comes to my mind in this is when Jesus said that he comes to convict the world or sin and righteousness and judgement. There has to be some place where our Christian life becomes a public witness - not as some kind of self-willed show-offy thing wherein we are consciously attempting to change society, but rather in the fact that how we live our lives in righteousness really does strike the conscience of those watching. It is those issues where it does become a matter of personal conscience such as the doctor who is asked to perform an abortion, the employee who is asked to fudge records, etc. where God then calls us to live as "children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world," (Philip. 2:15)

I remember from account, I think of Polycarp's martydom, that there were those who consciously decided they wanted to be martyrs and drew attention to themselves so that they would be arrested. In the end these people recanted under pressure. However, we also see the accounts of those Christians who simply on virtue of circumstances did have to suffer for their faith. I suppose the example is still relevant in that we work within the circumstances God gives us.