15
Imagine a father overcome with grief at the untimely death of his child. In his grief, he makes an image of the child. The person who was once a corpse he now honors as a god. He passes it on to those under his authority, along with certain mysteries and special ceremonies.
16
As time goes by, his godless custom becomes tradition. Eventually, his custom becomes law, and rulers order the people to worship these carved images.
17
These rulers, moreover, lived far away from most of their subjects. So because the people couldn't pay their respects in person, they imagined what the ruler looked like and made an image of their honored leader. By their diligent efforts, they were thus still able to shower the king with their flattery.
18
But the artist's desire to be recognized for his work also incited the fools to an ever greater intensity of worship.
19
Perhaps out of a desire to please the person in power, the artist makes the most of his artistic skill to fashion an even more beautiful and perfect image.
20
The masses, charmed by the object's workmanship, now begin to consider the object worthy of their worship, where not long before they had only honored the person as a human being.
21
In this way idolatry becomes a trap for one's life. Whether it is because of a father's misfortune or because people are ordered to do so, stones and plants begin to be called by the name that was never supposed to be shared with anything or anyone else.
22
Then, as if it weren't enough that they should err concerning the knowledge of God, other things follow. When living ignorantly in the midst of great war, people call such evil things peace.
23
Then, in the celebration of secret religious ceremonies involving the ritual murder of children or in hidden mysteries or in the mad orgies of strange worship practices,
24
people stop keeping their lives and their marriages pure. Instead, one person plots to kill another by lying in ambush. Another person causes grief by becoming sexually involved with another person's spouse.
25
Everything becomes a confused mix of blood, murder, theft, and deception. Corruption, breaking one's word, upheaval, false pledges—all these things abound.