VATICAN CITY — Men are more tempted by sins of the flesh while women are more likely to commit sins of the mind, according to research conducted by a 95-year-old Jesuit scholar and released by the Vatican.Among Catholics who confess, Fr. Roberto Busa found men reporting sex and food to be their primary vices. Women, on the other hand, tended toward the sins of pride and envy.
In a report published in L’Osservatore Romano, the Pope’s personal theologian, Msgr. Wojciech Giertych, noted Fr. Busa’s research indicated men most often succumbed to the traditional seven deadly sins in a typical order: lust, gluttony, sloth, anger, pride, envy and greed. Women ranked their temptations in a different order: pride, envy, anger, lust, gluttony, greed and sloth.
The Vatican’s Apostolic Penitentiary recently updated the list of deadly sins to include more modern temptations. The seven new-age mortal sins are genetic modification, experiments on the person, environmental pollution, taking or selling illegal drugs, social injustice, causing poverty and financial greed.
As a concept, sin doesn’t seem to be as big a concern for Catholics as it once was. In recent years, the Vatican has voiced worry about declining rates of confession, even though the church has not modified the portion of the Catechism of the Catholic Church that states “immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into Hell.” About 10 percent of Catholics who participated in a recent poll said they consider confession “an obstacle to their dialogue with God.” Nearly one third no longer consider confession mandatory.
“We are losing the notion of sin,” Pope Benedict said last year. “If people do not confess regularly, they risk slowing their spiritual rhythm.”
