Jesus and the Seven Deadly Sins -- Book Review

A review on a book by Fulton J. Sheen, The Seven Capital Sins

Yesterday, I was invited to join the Book Reading Day organized by the Emmaus at the Church of St. Mary. The person-in-charge brought some collection of books from the Emmaus library. Among the few that he placed on the table, a name written on a book caught my eyes: Fulton J. Sheen (1895 – 1979). He was one of the very famous Bishops whom many of my seniors have been talking about and is already on the way to be canonized.

To satisfy my curiosity, I picked this book titled The Seven Capital Sins that he wrote. I used to learn about these seven sins when I was in Junior College, studying about the Social Issues in my General Paper class. The lesson was pretty simple. The seven sins are anger, envy, lust, pride, gluttony, sloth, and covetousness. They are the most commonly sins committed by humans that can result or can be resulted from the societal and cultural changes in our society. There were nothing much to discuss, I think. Just stay away from falling into those seven sins and you will be fine.

In the past, I used to easily blame myself every time I felt that I have committed any of the seven. For example, once I felt angry with my friend, I would be angry with myself too. It became very difficult for me to forgive myself and the one who has made me angry, and probably I ended up hating my own self. When I felt jealous of others’ possession, I also quickly judged myself and others very negatively. All these occasions had somewhat did make my life miserable for several times, without knowing that not all that I thought were sinful, were really sins, and without knowing how I should prevent myself from having those sinful feelings.

However, it was yesterday that I discovered that there are so much more to unfold about these seven deadly sins. It was also after the three-and-a-half hours of reading this whole book that I realized how these sins are so much related to my own life and my religious faith as a Catholic.  

A very interesting thing that I found from this book is that for every single sin, the author can relate it with a bible verse portraying the time when Jesus encounters each of the sin in his life. This author has pretty well shown me how I can look at Jesus as my role model in facing human tendency to sin, but yet able to remain sinless. So, let me just share with you a little bit about each of the chapter that have brought me into a deeper reflection of my own self.

1.       Anger

In this first chapter, Sheen wrote that “if: (1) the cause of anger is just, e.g. to defense God’s honor (like what Jesus did when he cleared the Temple from the sellers); (2) the anger is kept under control and (3) be overcome quickly, the anger is not sinful.” So, even Jesus ever felt angry. But he is yet still sinless because his anger is fair. He wants to protect the Temple for it is meant to be a holy place.

Sheen mentioned how to forgive others who have caused our anger by recalling the time before Jesus died. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they not know what they do.” People can actually hurt us without really knowing that what they do is hurtful to us. Besides, have we ever thought of “why we can find excuses for our anger against others, and yet we refuse to admit the same excuses when they are angry with us”?

2.       Envy

This book taught me to use empathy as a tool to prevent ourselves from committing sin. Here, Sheen states that “envy is the source of our wrong judgments about others”. The poor hate the rich because the poor actually want to be rich themselves, but they are unable to earn the wealth. Am I just like the poor, hating others who have more than I do? So when I already have more, does that mean I should hate myself? And how can I tell that someone else is jealous if I, myself, have never felt that way?

 3.       Lust

“When we can find things that we love more than the flesh, the demands of the flesh would be less imperative.” Just like Jesus, he sacrifices the flesh, his own flesh, out of love for us. Sheen uses this verse, “Woman, behold your son…son, behold your mother.” So, a mother can say this to her son, “Don’t do anything of which your mother would ever be ashamed.” If the love for the mother is higher than the love of flesh, the boy will be more willing to sacrifice his lustful desire.  

 4.       Pride

“Why should we be proud? Is it because of our voice, wealth, beauty or talents? But are they your own? What are these but gifts from God, anyone of which He might take back from us this second? From a material point of view, we are worth so little.” These sentences really struck me. Often we forget that many things we are proud of are God’s blessing for us. So we shall glorify Him for all that we have and be humble like Jesus. “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” is in reparation for the sin of Pride. Jesus, who “humbles himself and places his most dependence on God, is always the thankful soul.”

 5.       Gluttony

“I thirst”, said Jesus at the Cross. He actually does not desire for the earthly water, but he wants a drink for his thirsty heart – thirsty for love. We, too, should “cultivate a spiritual hunger and thirst”. Jesus promised the nourishment of himself: “For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink.”

6.       Sloth

Remember Jesus said, “It is finished.” He did not just die and leave things undone. He finished what his Father has given him. We can also recall the parable of talents here. So we must be careful with this sloth. “Not only must we beware of spiritual sloth; we must work a completed life.”

 7.       Covetousness

I learnt that “the more ties we have to the earthly material wealth, the harder will it be for us to die. We were also never meant to be perfectly satisfied here below.” Before Jesus died, he said, “Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit.” So when we die, we cannot bring anything with us, except our spirit. We need to store up treasures for ourselves in heaven, instead of on earth.

Nevertheless, what I have mentioned above are just a glimpse of what this book has enlightened me with. There are so much more that are explained by this great author and I really want to thank him for writing this book. So I would like to encourage all of you, if you have some time to spare, do read this (only) ninety-four-page book and let it inspire you like how it has done unto me!

God bless!