New Yorkers were shell-shocked this week about the sudden political downfall (and planned resignation) of our governor, Eliot Spitzer, from his involvement in a prostitution ring scandal.

There’s probably not much to add to a story about a public figure whose fall from power was so startling because it was so sudden and so unexpected. However, it will be interesting to see if those preaching from the pulpits in New York’s churches and synagogues this weekend deal explicitly with the week’s news.

My bet: at least one minister or rabbi will evoke the theme of hubris and quote the American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. Though Niebuhr’s warnings of pride were often more directed at collective sin than individual failings, at least one of the famous quotes attributed to Niebuhr seems appropriate here:

“All human sin seems so much worse in its consequences than in its intentions.”