Every week in “Pulse,” Leadership Journal provides context and perspective on a stand-out cultural event from the past week, illuminating the ways it might impact local church ministry.

This week, an anonymous group of hackers made good on a threat. If Ashley Madison, a dating website dedicated to the explicit purpose of helping people initiate extra-marital affairs, didn’t shut down, they would expose the personal information of more than 30 million patrons of the service.

After waiting a month for compliance to their demands, the hackers dumped the names, emails, phone numbers, addresses, and credit card information of those who had used Ashley Madison under the presumption that they were paying for their privacy.

For Christians who rightly recoil at the practice of adultery, we may be tempted to indulge a sense of schadenfreude. Your sins will find you out, and sometimes it’s nice to sit back and watch that sort of poetic justice unfold.

Plus these ...