Envy

+ Cardinal George Pell, Archbishop of Sydney
8 Mar 2009

Christians are commanded to love their neighbours, not to envy them, not to covet their neighbour's wife or possessions.

All of us are envious at some time or other.  I would love to have possessed a singing voice like Pavarotti's; I envied him for his great gift.   As a child I envied those with a lot of cricketing ability.  Imagine the thrill of being able to bat like Adam Gilchrist, to slaughter the bowling and change the direction of a match.  How we missed him Warne and McGrath in the Test team.  Even New Zealand now gives us a run for our money!

These two examples of envy are harmless enough, not sinful in any sense let alone as candidates to be listed as deadly sins.

Envy comes from the heart and is quite different from admiring the capacities and accomplishments of others.  Envy starts to go wrong when we resent the success of others and worsens when we develop immoderate ambitions to achieve what we envy and strive to obtain this unjustly.

Envy is not quite the same as jealousy because envy resents what someone else has, while jealousy is more immediately self-centred, fearing that someone else might take what is ours e.g. promotion at work, the affections of a friend.  Envy can become so strong that we actually hate the people we envy, even when they have done nothing contrary to our interests.

Even the longest journeys begin with a few short steps and it is always a danger sign when we rejoice in the misfortunes of others, especially the small misfortunes of our friends or relatives.  To rejoice in the serious misfortune of a friend is perverse and the Christian commandment to love our enemies should deter us from rejoicing in their personal sufferings.  Naturally we are entitled to rejoice when a bad cause is halted or reversed.

Another danger sign that envy is bubbling up in our hearts is a reluctance to praise others or to thank them for their contributions.  We are in deeper trouble when we refuse to praise others, seem in fact unable to do so, while we descend even further down the slippery slope of envy when we criticize those who are commended, simply because they are commended.  Envy drives us to find some fault and defect in every situation.

As we grow old we can be tempted to envy young people their youth, vitality and optimism and not even realize this.  The envy is masked by seizing on the imperfections of the young and criticizing them.

Young people are imperfect, but they are generally what their elders have made of them.  As a wise old Irish-Australian mother used to say "what is in the cat comes out in the kitten".

Envious people are not kind, often pitiless.  Kind people are pleased when others do well.