# Sins that cry to heaven: please explain **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 16, 2005, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158 "2005-05-16T23:53:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![WeRSauron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f19dbf/32.png) [@WeRSauron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WeRSauron)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2005, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/1 "2005-05-16T23:53:53Z")
The Catholic Church teaches in the _Catechism of the Catholic Church_ (article 1867, italics in original): > [@](#): > > The catechetical tradition also recalls that there are “_sins that cry to heaven_”: the blood of Abel, the sin of the Sodomites, the cry of the people oppressed in Egypt, the cry of the foreigner, the widow, and the orphan, injustice to the wage earner. What does “sins that cry to heaven” mean? What are the consequences of this crying? What does the blood of Abel refer to? What does the sin of the Sodomites refer to? What does the cry of the foreigner refer to? Why do these particular sins, instead of and not including others, cry to heaven? WRS ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/2 "2005-05-17T00:50:37Z")
> [@](#): > > What does “sins that cry to heaven” mean? What are the consequences of this crying? It gets god’s attention in a big way. > [@](#): > > What does the blood of Abel refer to? Murder. > [@](#): > > What does the sin of the Sodomites refer to? Rape, presumably. > [@](#): > > What does the cry of the foreigner refer to? Not sure. > [@](#): > > Why do these particular sins, instead of and not including others, cry to heaven? Because of their seriousness the put the actor in a state of seperation from the church of god, in all its forms, unless the actor repents. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/3 "2005-05-17T01:01:53Z")
> [@WeRSauron](#): > > What does the blood of Abel refer to? Not just murder, but the murder of a brother and for no real reason. > [@](#): > > What does the sin of the Sodomites refer to? That’s a great debate in itself. > [@](#): > > What does the cry of the foreigner refer to? Well, these would be direct violations of “Do not put a stumbling block before the blind man, the widow, or the orphan. But fear God” and “Be kind unto the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” Sins against the blindman, widow, and orphan are considered especially cruel as they were helpless. The same is true of a foreigner. > [@](#): > > Why do these particular sins, instead of and not including others, cry to heaven? Idunno, constitutional ammendment? ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/4 "2005-05-17T01:52:16Z")
Torah scholar all agree, the sin of Sodom was inhospability. Much as I would like to blame the torah, the fault lays in an intentional mistranslation, interpreted just the way it’s meant to be, not the real words. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/5 "2005-05-17T02:11:46Z")
Inhospitality? ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/6 "2005-05-17T02:33:04Z")
**Squink** Yep. Ihosptality. A traveller arriving at Sodom or Gamorrah (or generally any other town in the middle east) didn’t have enough food and water to make it to another town. If you turned them away, they died. Rather than taking in travellers and giving them food and shelter, the people of Sodom and Gamorrah laughed at them, played tricks on them, and were rude. There’s a Jewish folktale that every citizen of Sodom had a special gold coin bearing their personal mark. Whenever a stranger arrived in town, the people would happily give them a gold coin and direct them to market to buy provisions. The merchants would refuse to sell the stranger a crumb of food or a drop of water. The stranger would wander around town, begging for food and offering a fortune for it. Eventually, they would die of thirst with a sack full of gold on their back. Then, the people of Sodom would strip the corpse and take back their coins, which they knew by the mark. ---
**Author:** ![cwthree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9de0a6/32.png) [@cwthree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cwthree)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/7 "2005-05-17T02:58:25Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > **Squink** Yep. Ihosptality. There’s a midrash about a woman of Sodom who provided food and water to strangers. When her neighbors found out what she had done, they covered her with honey and tied her to a stake to be attacked by biting insects. The people of Sodom were also supposed to be callously indifferent to the needs of their own people. Specifically, it is said that they did not provide for the widows and orphans among them. ---
**Author:** ![Priam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/77aa72/32.png) [@Priam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Priam)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/8 "2005-05-17T03:08:15Z")
I’d just like to pop in and say that I already find this thread fascinating. As for “sins that cry unto heaven”, I’d use the following description… We live in a world where people sin almost constantly. You could callously call most of them background noise: the easy lie, the quick scam, ignoring the pain of another… at some point, we are all guilty of at least one. We can even sometimes justify them. There are other crimes without justification beyond the desire for pain or vengeance, crimes that no person should ever commit in their life: despicably inhospitable treatment to others, violence towards one who loves you, crimes committed on the weak and powerless around you. These are sins that go beyond the pale of human fallibility, beyond the point of easy explanation. They are sins that cry to heaven for justice. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/9 "2005-05-17T04:05:26Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > **Squink** Yep. Inhosptality. Thanks **DC**. Once in a while I run into a word in these religion threads that I have never seen before. You make the Sodomites sound pretty damned inhospitable! ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2005, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sins-that-cry-to-heaven-please-explain/304158/10 "2005-05-17T04:26:56Z")
I found it interesting too. I understood about hospitality being their crime, and suspected cruelty was involved, but had never really heard the ugly details. So, it was not only inhospitality, it was a sneaky and cowardly form of murder by deliberate neglect. Bad enough to leave someone in a desert without supplies, even worse if he is that way because you made it so on purpose. They got what they earned.