We are all quite familiar with the seven capital sins:\npride, greed, envy, wrath, lust, gluttony, and sloth. Perhaps we learned about\nthem in a classroom setting; certainly we have encountered them in ourselves\nand others!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today, I would like to invite each of us to do something we normally don\u2019t do \u2013 to feel deeply the Father\u2019s kindness toward us in our weaknesses and our repeated tendency towards sin. Then, with Jesus, we can allow ourselves to be curious about these inclinations that we experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As an accomplished sinner myself and as one who offers pastoral care to sinners, I find that we fallen humans tend to feel a great deal of shame and contempt around our weaknesses, our vulnerability to sin, and the details of our acting out. We tend to despise any part of ourselves that feels inclined to think or speak or act in one of these ways. Whether an inclination to numb out in slothfulness, to overeat, to compare ourselves with others and feel sadness, or to enter the realm of sexual fantasizing, we just wish that it would all go away. Shame incites us to see the broken pieces of our heart as worthless garbage to be incinerated, rather than as bearing the image of God and beckoning us back to the heart of the Father.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A deeper understanding of the capital sins \u2013 what they\nreally are and why they are called \u201ccapital\u201d in the first place \u2013 leads us to seek\ntraces of God\u2019s goodness even in those places of our heart that feel totally\nbeyond his reach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If we speak with greater accuracy, these seven impulses are not \u201csins\u201d in the full and proper sense. They are tendencies or vulnerabilities in us. They are called \u201csins\u201d because they come from sin and incline us toward sin. In Catholic theology, we speak of \u201cconcupiscence\u201d as a wound in us, a strong inclination toward sinfulness that is part of the human experience as a result of the Fall of Adam and Eve. This wound of concupiscence is, of course, exacerbated by our own choices in life. The more we sin, the more we want to sin. The seven capital sins can then be understood as seven different ways that fallen human beings experience a strong inclination toward sin. We do not find it difficult to allow ourselves to indulge in any one of these seven inclinations. Jesus speaks about the wide gate and easy road that leads to destruction \u2013 in contrast to the narrow gate and difficult road that leads to life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Indeed, we probably best know these tendencies as the \u201cseven deadly sins\u201d \u2013 because they easily become toxic, harmful, and deeply destructive. Unchecked, they rupture our relationships with God, others, and self, and ultimately lead towaerd death in every sense \u2013 physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Each of us is created in the image and likeness of a God who is love \u2013 an eternal communion of persons in glorious relationship. We innately understand just how destructive our acting out becomes \u2013 and the devil is all too eager to bury us in shame. His endgame is to tear away as many of us as he can and get us to agree to never ending isolation, misery, and torment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But why are these seven tendencies called \u201ccapital\nsins\u201d? The word \u201ccapital\u201d comes from the\nLatin caput<\/em> \u2013 which means \u201chead,\u201d but\ncan also mean \u201csource.\u201d John Cassian and\nGregory the Great reflect on how each of these impulses becomes a source of\nsinfulness in us \u2013 not sins in and of themselves, but, if unchecked, strong\nimpulses that lead us down the road of perdition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The thing is, the devil cannot create. He is not God. He can only use the good and beautiful things God has created in an attempt to lie and steal and destroy. Ignatius of Loyola refers to the devil as \u201cthe enemy of human nature.\u201d He absolutely despises us. He hates the glory of God that shines in each of us. That is where he attacks the hardest \u2013 which in a backwards way teaches us an important lesson: if we look deeply into our hearts at the places where we experience the most intense attack in the form of the seven capital sins, there we will find God\u2019s glory the most present. Why else would the devil attack us so intensely there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n In other words, at the core of each of these seven capital sins in us, we find amazingly good<\/strong> desires and needs that God has placed in the human heart. Yes, these seven tendencies can easily become sources of sinfulness that have great potential to lead us astray. But they can also be deeply helpful clues to lead us back to God!<\/p>\n\n\n\n That is where tender kindness, childlike wonder, and holy curiosity come in. Rather than shaming myself, I can start noticing what is happening in my heart. My anger is there whether I like it or not! Yes, I can allow it to leak out in aggression toward others or myself. But it can also be an invitation into the fullness of God\u2019s truth and justice, and an awakening of my prophetic identity in Christ. In my envy I can notice the things my heart deeply aches for \u2013 often things the Lord deeply desires for me \u2013 but only if I am willing to allow myself to feel the heartache of longing and waiting. In my lust I can notice all kinds of desires and needs \u2013 to be desired and chosen, to be safe and secure, to be embraced, to be known and understood, or to be loved as I am, (notice that none of these is really about sex!). In my sloth I may discover much less \u201claziness\u201d and much more shame and fear \u2013 an urge to hide and isolate and turn away when what I actually need is real relationships, in which I can be cared for precisely where I feel the weakest and most vulnerable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whatever capital sins we find to be our \u201cpersonal favorites\u201d are also very likely the places we will find the deepest and holiest longings of our hearts \u2013places in which our loving Father desires us to experience our true dignity, meaning, and purpose as his beloved children. Each of us can become \u201cdisciples\u201d \u2013 yes, in the sense of discipline, but even more so by allowing Jesus to help us become students<\/strong> of our own heart, which is created in the image and likeness of God and declared by him to be \u201cvery good.\u201d If we open ourselves to that experience of authentic discipleship, the places of our deepest sorrow and struggle will become the very places that lead us back to the heart of the Father.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We are all quite familiar with the seven capital sins: pride, greed, envy, wrath, lust, gluttony, and sloth. Perhaps we learned about them in a classroom setting; certainly we have encountered them in ourselves and others! Today, I would like to invite each of us to do something we normally don\u2019t do \u2013 to feel … <\/p>\n