The seven deadly sins and society. How do they fit together?

“There are 7 deadly sins, Captain.” – Se7en

So, here are the movie versions of sin.  Except Pride.  Is Pride really blonde?

Some time ago I read a book that my friend wrote (there is a link below where you can get it from Amazon – I make no money from that) about sin.  I enjoyed the book, as well as one can enjoy a book that makes you feel absolutely horrible about how sinful and wretched you are.  And I mean that in the best way – how often do you have the benefit of self-reflection on your faults?  Thankfully, the author doesn’t leave you hanging, and gives you a path forward on the whole salvation from sin thing (note:  he’s a priest, so the word “Jesus” just might be a spoiler).  I heartily recommend the book.

Is sin at the problem with current society?  Maybe.  But first let’s discuss the sins.

As I recall (it’s been a while since I read it) one construct that Father Joseph used for discussing sin was the Seven Deadly Sins.  He used the mnemonic “PALE GAS” to go through them.  I’ll do the same.

Pride – Pride is the big one, perhaps the source of all the other sins.  An example:  If you’re religious, you’d accept that your intellect was given to you by God.  If you’re not religious, you’d accept that your intellect was a happy genetic accident.  In either case, no matter how smart you are, you’ve done nothing to be that smart, so taking pride in your intellect is, well, bad.  That’s why pride is the primo sin – it takes all the glory for who and what you are and wraps it up into your own ego.  It puts you and your ego at the center of the universe, when in reality no one thinks about you as much as you think they do.  Unless you’re Donald Trump.  Then people (from both sides) totally obsess over you.

Anger – This is also known as Wrath, but PWLE GAS doesn’t sound so good, unless you’re from some Eastern European country that uses colored wrapping paper for money and has a vowel shortage.  Anger is feeling and wishing for unjust or excessive punishment – execution for parking offenses, that sort of thing, or punishing the innocent, just because they are weaker than you.  Again, Wrath separates you from both God and reality by making the righting of wrongs (real or not) not about justice, but about you.  You can see how Pride echoes here . . . .

Lust – Lust isn’t love, it’s a deep and intense passionate desire that throws morality, propriety, and sometimes legality to the winds.  As sins go, this one at least (in some forms) is mutual, so it’s not as strong as pure Pride.  In some forms, it’s considered the least serious of all mortal sins, but, you know, it’s still a mortal sin.  Outside of religion, allowing Lust to drive your life tends to lead to a lot of poor decisions – just ask anyone in Hollywood®.

Envy – Like any of the sins, Envy has various gradations.  First you are jealous that your neighbor has a complete set of PEZ® dispensers of every United States Secretary of Agriculture ever.  Then you find out he has all of the United States Secretary of Commerce PEZ™ dispensers.  Then you go all Cain on his Abel.  Yup.  Envy brings you farther from God, but it also fills you with hate.

Gluttony – Generally, Gluttony is considered more of a sin when your consumption (or overconsumption) of resources will starve someone else – but it really boils down to an unbridled passion for selfishness.  Eating and drinking as the purpose of life, rather than to support it.  It’s fairly obvious how this is both bad for you, and drives you farther from God.

Avarice – This sin is also known as greed, but if we called it that, then the mnemonic would be PWLE GGS.  And what does that even mean?  Where lust is for a person, and gluttony is for food, avarice is for stuff.  That just makes it worse.  Pop Wilder described avarice best when he told me, “A farmer doesn’t want all the land in the world, son, he just wants that which adjoins his.”  This pulls you away from God though making you focus on the things only of this world.  This focus turns men into machines – focused only on owning (not creating) wealth.  See reason number 53 that I don’t want to live in New York City . . . .

Yeah, it sucks to be a sloth.

Sloth – Sloth isn’t just about being lazy – Sloth is giving up.  It’s abdication of responsibility for whatever reason, often as a result of the other sins, or through giving up due to depression or despondency (which used to be one of the eight deadly sins, but got voted off in the semi-finals).   It’s obvious on how this sin hurts you whether you’re a believer or not.

I heartily recommend Father Joseph’s book, whether or not you are a Christian or an agnostic or an atheist.  I think the truths that it speaks to are so fundamental in our society that this could be one of the better books on self-improvement available today.  Seriously.  I read this book, thinking I was doing okay.  (Pride will do that to you.)  Every page that I read I kinda cringed when it described me, something I felt, or something I was doing as tied into one of these sins.  I promise you – there’s not a week that goes by that you (and I!) aren’t attracted to and tempted to commit each of these sins weekly.

Oh, and my copy is signed!  (See, I just used my Pride to Envy all over you.)

And these sins are important whether or not you are religious because these sins and our universal-ish understanding of them in the Western world form the basis of Western culture.  Are there analogues in Chinese Confucianism, Shinto, or the tribal religions of Africa?  Or Islam?

I have no idea.  And it would require like a zillion Google® searches to sort that out.  But it’s irrelevant.

I do know that the culture of the West was founded on this shared concept of sin.

And we agree that these things are bad, right?

Have we managed to rebrand many of these sins as virtues?

• “Check out my InstaFace® selfie!”
• “He had it coming to him.”
• “If it feels go, do it!”
• “You deserve what the 1% have.”
• “Have another piece of cake – YOLO!”
• “We’re not Boy Scouts®, we’re here to make money.”
• “Let somebody else do it. You’ve done enough.”

One of the virtues of the Seven Deadly Sins is that the common belief in them is the basis for a shared morality in a stable civilization.  One can infer that that shared belief (beyond the salubrious Christian effects on your immortal soul, if you’re into that sort of thing) is beneficial because it evolved with Western civilization.

Can the West live without the concept of sin?

I’m not sure that it can.  Let’s just take one of them:  Envy.

The biggest evil of the twentieth century was communism.  I’m not saying that because it’s an opinion – it’s an objective fact.  More people died because of communism than any other ideological cause during that century – over 140,000,000.

Communism was built on Envy; the concept that “from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.”  And Ivan needs Pyotr’s farm.  And Ivan’s wife needs Pyotr’s wife’s new butter churn.  And so on.

Nearly a billion people died from gluttony – it causes heart disease along with a host of other diseases.

Anger led to war and murder.  240,000,000.

So, deadly wasn’t a euphemism – outside of spiritual conditions, these sins actually lead to real and temporal misery and death.

So there appears to be some limited anecdotal evidence that virtue is better than sin.

Which brings me back to society.  If society doesn’t agree on the same cultural precepts which have driven the creation of knowledge and wealth for several thousand years . . . nah, never mind.  I’m sure it will be fine.