High-Tech Home-Wreckers for Hire

by Fr. Roger Landry - November 21, 2008

There's a passage in St. Paul's Letter to the Church in Philippi in which he calls the attention of the Macedonian Christians to the epicureans among whom they were living. He calls these hedonists "enemies of the cross of Christ" and says, "their end is destruction, their god is their appetite, and their glory is in their shame." They were, in other words, freely giving rein to their carnal desires, were proud of it, were leading themselves to ruin. It brought St. Paul, who sought their good and salvation, to tears (Phil 3:18-19).

As modern culture has been rapidly shedding its Christian foundations and regressing to a similar set of pre-Christian sensualist mores, we should not be surprised that what was recently considered shameful is now being increasingly acclaimed. We've seen it with teenage sex, which is now celebrated in kids' magazines, favorably portrayed by Hollywood, and accepted and abetted by public school sexual education curricula. We've seen it with abortion, when, like the ancient Spartans, many now consider it a civil right and justifiable good to end the lives of babies they consider unwanted and imperfect. We've seen it more recently with same-sex relationships; as in Athens in the age of Plato, homoeroticism is now glamorized and, unlike ancient Athens, considered alone a sufficient foundation for marriage.

Now we're seeing a highly-publicized and well-funded effort to idealize adultery.

Last week, the Ashley Madison agency began a half-million dollar Boston-area media blitz entitled, "Life is Short: Have an Affair." Starting with radio ads on radio stations WAAF and WBCN, but hoping to expand to television, billboards and print media, the company seeks to arouse customers to sign up for an internet-based dating service specializing in arranging adulterous dalliances.

One of their ads has a male voiceover say, "Most of us can recover from a one-night stand with the wrong woman, but not when it's every night for the rest of our lives." Another features two people in the heat of the moment with the words, "This couple is married… but not to each other. Life is Short. Have an Affair." A print ad shows a scantily-clad supermodel with the caption, "100% of people cheat…" and then at the bottom says, essentially, "on our website," and gives the url.

Ashley Madison can spend millions to produce slick commercials to romanticize what they're selling, but at the end of the day its directors are nothing but sleazy high-tech pimps. They arrange, with devilish ingenuity, for two people to prostitute themselves while the company pockets the proceeds.

The directors claim, of course, to be simple businessmen. They say, against their critics, that they're not trying to promote adultery, but merely attempting to assist those who have already made up their mind to cheat. That pseudo-altruism will put them in the same category for civic persons of the year as drug peddlers, who of course never try to get kids to do drugs but merely want to provide a service for those who have already made up their mind to get high.

Ashley Madison is a company that seeks to profit from practices that everyone knows and statistics demonstrate injures, often fatally, persons, marriages and families. It tries to seduce people into breaking one of the most sacred promises a human being will ever make. It engages in high-tech home-wrecking.

The Massachusetts bishops released a statement last Friday criticizing the commercials (see p. 15). "As pastors and teachers," they wrote, they felt "compelled to speak in support of marriage in light of a recent advertising campaign promoting adultery in the Commonwealth… This wrongful enterprise threatens not only the oldest and most foundational of human institutions but also the common good of all."

Its promotion of adultery attacks the very foundation of marriage, which "requires honesty, loyalty, trust, self-sacrifice, personal responsibility, respect, and commitment." All of these virtues are undermined by this most vicious form of cheating. It destabilizes the most important institution in the life of children and most adults. "Where marriage is weakened," the bishops state, "the social cost is enormous."

Our shepherds recognize that marital infidelity, like the marriage it violates, is never merely a private act, but has huge public consequences. It is a supremely selfish action that wounds or breaks marriages and harms innocent spouses and kids, children conceived through adultery, mutual friends and colleagues, as well as society as a whole, which must pick up so many of the emotional, social and financial pieces left by its calamitous path.

The bishops "commend those media outlets that have refused this advertising." These include WEEI (850 am), WRKO (680 am) and the National Football League, which has rebuffed Ashley Madison's attempt to run ads during the Super Bowl. The bishops "ask other media outlets to do the same." That's a specific request to radio stations WAAF (97.7/107.3) and WBCN (104.1), which have so far proved resistant to taking the adultery ads off the air. Readers interested in trying to persuade these stations to do the right thing are encouraged to call 617.779.5411 (WAAF) and 617.746.1400 (WBCN).

Life is indeed short. That's why the choices we make are even more consequential. No one will ever find true happiness by betraying one's family and one's word, especially with persons who are likewise demonstrable traitors to their families and sacred commitments. Those at Ashley Madison are glorying in their shame and will bring nothing but shame and heartbreak to those who succumb to their inveigling.

Since life is short, people should make choices they won't regret — and their spouses and kids won't forget.

Father Roger J. Landry is pastor of St. Anthony of Padua in New Bedford, MA and Executive Editor of The Anchor, the weekly newspaper of the Diocese of Fall River.