Introduction: Bill O'Reilly begins every broadcast of "The O'Reilly Factor" with a warning: "Warning: You are about to enter a No-Spin Zone."

I begin the sermon this morning with a warning: You are about to enter a No-Spin Zone where you will hear words like sin, Satan, and evil.

And we don't like to talk about evil or sin or the Devil. We prefer the language of "mitigating circumstances" or the psychotherapeutic vocabulary of "dysfunction" or "antisocial behavior" or "anger disorder." Mass murderers like Hitler and Stalin have even been described as suffering from "mental disorders" (see Andrew Delbanco, The Death of Satan [1995]). The Houston woman who murdered her five children is a victim of "post partum depression."

To talk about sin any more is about as welcome as a pork chop at P…