Drug use, pollution, genetic manipulations and social and economic injustices have joined lust and sloth on the age-old list of deadly sins, leaving some wondering if the additions signal a Vatican moving to modernize — or just to expand on the obvious.
Archbishop Gianfranco Girotti, head of the Vatican Apostolic Penitentiary, which deals with sin and absolution, told the official Vatican newspaper, l’Osservatore Romano, about the new sins on March 9.
There is no definitive list of mortal sins, but the sins of lust, anger, sloth, pride, avarice, gluttony and envy were laid down in the sixth century by Pope Gregory the Great.
Father Dominique Hanna of Our Lady of Cedars Catholic Church in Jamaica Plain said the new additions can fit under the umbrella of mortal and deadly sins.
“I don’t think it changes the tradition,” he said. “I think it’s just clarification of what was already there.”
He said the biggest controversy is Pope Benedict XVI’s reaffirmation that genetic manipulation — including stem cell research and gender-changing operations — is a sin.
“That is a hot topic right now and I don’t know if it will get a positive response from the more liberal community,” Hanna said.
Danny White, a Georgia Institute of Technology student, said he likes to lounge at the Boston University Catholic Center and said the Vatican’s recognition of pollution, drugs and economic injustices as sins is a progressive event in the Catholic community.
“I think that Catholicism is often seen as a conservative and sometimes backwards religion in terms of its political perspectives,” he said. “The fact that the Pope is embracing ecological issues…will change the way Catholicism is viewed by others.”
Stu Manzano, music director at the Catholic Center, said he thinks the Vatican’s interest in ecological issues will be a good hook for college students.
“It’s a topic that students have a lot of access to in terms of organizing projects and spreading awareness, so they have the potential to have huge influence over that matter,” he said.
College of Arts and Sciences sophomore Seon-Joo Oh said adding these sins to the list will help spread awareness about the issues and encourage Catholics to take action.
“Catholics all over the world take an interest in what the pope has to say,” Oh said.
Father Paul Helfrich, director of the BU Catholic Center, said he believes these changes will help the Catholic community, especially those who put great value in the Vatican’s opinion, and will give them a way to adjust to modernization.
Father Justin Bailey of St. Anthony’s Shrine in Boston said the announcement will encourage Catholics to reject these social ills.
“I think people who are conscious of their behavior already knew that these additions were forms of sin, so it’s just a refinement of the old tradition,” he said.