The Seven Deadly Sins In Practice

In practice, most churches today ignore the seven deadly sins, eliminating even the potential for applying them to the rich and powerful. When was the last time you read or heard of any conservative evangelical churches - usually very vocal about how Christianity is needed for morality - say anything against gluttony, greed, envy, or anger? The only "deadly sin" which most have retained is lust, which might explain why it's been expanded in so many directions.

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Seven Deadly Sins in Detail

Pride: Pride (Vanity), is the excessive belief in one's abilities, such that you don't give credit to God. Aquinas argued that all other sins stem from Pride, so critiques of the Christian notion of sin generally should start here: "inordinate self-love is the cause of every sin...the root of pride is found to consist in man not being, in some way, subject to God and His rule." Among the problems with Christian teaching against pride is that it encourages people to be submissive to religious authorities in order to submit to God, thus enhancing institutional church power. We can contrast this with Aristotle's description of pride, or respect for oneself, as the greatest of all virtues. Rational pride makes a person harder to rule and dominate.

Envy: Envy is a desire to possess what others have, whether material objects (like cars) or character traits, like a positive outlook or patience. Making envy a sin encourages Christians to be satisfied with what they have rather than object to others' unjust power or seek to gain what others have.

Gluttony: Gluttony is usually associated with eating too much, but it has a broader connotation of trying to consume more of anything that you actually need, food included. Teaching that gluttony is a sin is a good way to encourage those with very little to not want more and to be content with how little they are able to consume since more would be sinful.

Lust: Lust is the desire to experience physical, sensual pleasures (not just those which are sexual), causing us to ignore more important spiritual needs or commandments. The popularity of this sin is revealed by how more gets written in condemnation of it than for just about any other sin. Condemning lust and physical pleasure is part of Christianity's general effort to promote the afterlife over this life and what it has to offer.

Anger: Anger (Wrath) is the sin of rejecting the Love and Patience we should feel for others and opting instead for violent or hateful interaction. Many Christian acts over the centuries (like the Inquisition and Crusades) may seem to have motivated by anger, not love, but were excused by saying the motivation was the love of God, or love of a person's soul — so much love that it was necessary to harm others physically. Condemnation of anger as a sin is useful to suppress efforts to correct injustice, especially the injustices of religious authorities.

Greed: Greed (Avarice) is a desire for material gain. Similar to Gluttony and Envy, gain rather than consumption or possession is key here. Religious authorities too rarely condemn how the rich possess much while the poor possess little — great wealth has often been justified by claiming that it's what God wants for a person. Condemning greed keeps the poor in their place, though, and prevents them from wanting to have more.

Sloth: Sloth is the most misunderstood of the Seven Deadly Sins. Often regarded as laziness, it is more accurately translated as apathy: when a person is apathetic, they no longer care about their duty to God and ignore their spiritual well-being. Condemning sloth is a way to keep people active in the church in case they start to realize how useless religion and theism really are.

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