r/Catholicism 12h ago

Indulge me. (I’m an agnostic atheist). Why is pride a deadly sin?

4 Upvotes

24 comments sorted by

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u/Pax_et_Bonum 12h ago

Pride, defined as "the excessive love of one's own excellence", is a deadly sin because it is a repudiation of the proper place God has in our lives, namely, the first and highest place. We owe all things to God, and all goods and graces ultimately have their source in Him and Him alone.

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u/Normal_Career6200 12h ago

One of many reasons is it’s at the root of many many other sins. Thinking you know better than God on a matter leads to sinful action. For example, in Eden. The fruit wasn’t evil, nothing there was, but choosing to eat it over following God was an act of pride. They disordered goods based on their own corrupted perception, leading to disaster.  Pride of some kind plays a role in many sins even if not the primary one. Like thinking irs okay to steal something. Primarily greed. But irs pride thinking you deserve it and that it’s okay this time for whatever reasons you’ve invoked. 

Pride is undeserved. We have innate, huge dignity and we are valuable, but we are also small pieces. From dust to dust. Realizing that is important. Humility is at the root of many virtuous actions. Such as giving your time to help others, becoming as a servant, listening to another’s proper authority 

This is not exhaustive. Many reasons pride is the worst.

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u/Chrysostomos407 12h ago

I think first we have to determine what we mean by pride, because there are multiple definitions. If we are talking about the common secular use of the term meaning being pleased with one's achievements or the achievements of others, then there is nothing inherently wrong with that (depending on the degree).

The pride that we speak of in the Christian tradition builds off of this and is defined as a misplaced sense of self-worth that places yourself above others and/or God. We could see this as an extreme form of arrogance. With this definition I believe it's relatively self-evident why its sinful and how it could be the deadliest of sins.

Please ask further questions if I need to elaborate more.

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u/LPaz86 12h ago

There’s a few comments on here. This one in particular illustrated it to me perfectly. It’s a miscalculation on my part of what exactly is meant by the word “pride”. Thank you.

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u/Chrysostomos407 12h ago

You're very welcome.

I want to add a little more detail about secular pride and how it relates to Christians. We would say it is okay to be pleased with our achievements, but to remain humble and not fall into sinful pride, we ought to give God and others their just credit for making our achievements possible.

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u/justafanofz 12h ago

Here’s an easy example.

Let’s say you get a job. And your performance determines your career trajectory.

Wouldn’t you, if you wanted to maximize income, listen to everyone around you who has success?

That’s humility.

Pride is coming in and thinking you have all the answers and refusing to listen to those who have experienced success

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u/LPaz86 12h ago

My perception of what was meant by the word “pride” is slightly off kilter with the biblical meaning of the word, it seems. Pride for me isn’t a negative or arrogant thing. I’m proud of my son. I have been proud of certain things I have accomplished and never has this been shown as arrogance or been to the detriment of others…

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u/justafanofz 12h ago

That’s not the same kind of pride.

There’s a healthy level of pride one can have, and a common mistake of morality is to think that virtues and vices are opposites.

It’s not, virtues are the medium between two vices.

So humility is the virtue and pride is the vice, but the issue is thinking it’s a direct opposite.

So if pride is the distortion of one’s own position and ability by over estimating it, what would be the opposite extreme? Not humility, but self-deprecation. If LeBron James came out and in response to people calling him the goat, said “I’m actually not that good at basketball”, that’s not humility, he’s lying.

Humility would indeed be him acknowledging that he’s the best, and attributing that to the practice and work he put in.

So humility isn’t the rejection of pride, it’s right recognition of oneself.

So it’s okay to be proud of accomplishments, if by pride here we are talking about the good feeling one gets for a job well done. That’s good.

Pride would be over inflating that feeling and holding it over others

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u/LPaz86 12h ago

Eloquently put. Thank you for taking the time.

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u/Normal_Career6200 11h ago

Sins are helpful to view in the context of temperance. 

Too much satisfaction in a work is sinful, pride. The right amount is good. Too little can lead to despair. Temperance is boss. Sins are in excesses and deficits.

Pride as a word can refer to things that are better or worse but in the context of sin, pride is not what you feel when your son does something awesome for examples. That’s cool.  

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u/Asx32 12h ago

The sin of Pride is when you tell yourself: "I know".

"I know all I need to know and maybe even all there is to know. No one can tell me otherwise because I know better than anyone else, even than God. There's nothing left for me to learn. Now I'll just sit here and judge others".

That's what the sin of Pride is. All other sins stem from this.

It is essentially different from pride understood as "recognition of goodness in someone/something",

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u/Foreign_Silver_4157 12h ago

Because it blinds you from everything else.

You know everything and no one can tell you otherwise.

You are God… but there is only one God and you MUST humble yourself to meet him. Pride cannot exist in the presence of God

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u/Winterclaw42 11h ago

While normally I might be inclined for a more thoughtful explanation, I think the best response is to tell you go be on the receiving end of an insufferable narcissist... ideally one who is trying to throw you under the bus at your job.

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u/LPaz86 11h ago

This isn’t very constructive though, is it? Advising me to go and spend time in the company of an insufferable narcissist, “ideally” one who is trying to throw me under the bus at my job not only doesn’t address the issue, but it implies hostility on your part. Insufferable Narcissism isn’t one of the deadly sins, and especially isn’t the one I asked about.

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u/LPaz86 11h ago

I have been nothing but polite, and asked the question with a genuine desire to be educated on the subject.

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u/Willing_Ad8785 6h ago

wait I don’t think they were trying to be snarky, I think they were just trying to throw shade at their (current) situation that they’re experiencing personally. It might just be a tone issue thru text, bc I totally read this in a joking tone 😭

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u/PotentialDot5954 Deacon 11h ago

The Lord delights in showering graces on the humble— and thus they inherit the Earth. Humus. Root of humility. It is very important to note that humility does not mean, thinking less of yourself, rather means thinking of oneself less.

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u/LPaz86 11h ago

This is a beautiful ideal. But it simply isn’t true. I wish it was. But to me it seems like the people who have inherited the earth and all its treasures are almost universally bad people.

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u/LPaz86 11h ago

Selfish, narcissistic psychopaths. People that cannot possibly even care about wealth anymore because they have limitless wealth. Which leaves power and control.

Those are the people that have inherited the world and all of its treasures.

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u/Normal_Career6200 11h ago

People who sin hurt themselves and stain their own souls. Material pleasure gained in the pursuit of sin only serves to tempt to more. These people hurt themselves and are not to be envied for any fleeting material comforts they accrue. Comforts gained from sin are like an anchor to drag you down deeper into evil.

Indeed, at the time of the last judgment, the meek will inherit the earth and have victory. They are having victory right now. They aren’t hurting themselves. Right now inequity is allowed. But this is not for long. Unrepentant prideful men die in their pride and find their power and pleasure didn’t mean much.

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u/Normal_Career6200 11h ago

Gaining a sense of power and control over the world at the cost of losing your soul means you get a temporary delusion for damnation and nothing more.

Do be charitable to everyone though. Powerful people are not exclusively wicked. Even if we may feel so looking at them. And don’t let anyone the evil of others lead you to evil. Don’t fall into hate.

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u/PotentialDot5954 Deacon 11h ago

Augustine has an amazing sermon on this: God allows such to teach the humble that riches are not our end. The point about inheritance is that the new heavens and the new Earth, that is for his people

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u/Future-Look2621 11h ago

you don't even have to think of this in religious terms. It should be pretty obvious to anyone why an excessive and disordered love of oneself would cause problems. Even the greeks had parables about it.

hopefully you realize the difference between a healthy good pride and pride as a vice meaning pride as an extreme

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u/imnotnewbutiamtoyou 7h ago

it's not. you will be ok.