Pride Was the Very First Sin

Pride is the Beginning of Every Other Sin

Revelation 12:7 Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they were defeated and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9 And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him

Pride was the first sin. Even before the Original Sin of mankind in the Garden of Eden, Satan and his angels had already committed the first sin in creation. They had been given a choice to serve God and His will and refused. And unlike human intellect which is fallen, limited and can continue to learn more info and so change their views, angels have a different intellect. At the beginning of creation, Satan and his demons were pure, perfect and holy. They had no sin and their nature was not fallen. They had perfect use of their intellect and will and they knew absolutely everything that they could possibly know that had been revealed to them by God. (No creature has omniscience, but creatures can have perfect control of their will, intellect and understanding of the knowledge that they do have.)

So when Satan and his demons were presented with the choice from God to serve His will, they already knew with perfect clarity what the consequences would be for their decision to accept or reject. That is what makes their rejection of the will of God so horrific. They knew they would be cast into hell and still willfully chose it rather than submit to the will of God. When they made their choice to reject God and His will, that choice was permanent and eternal. Their wills became fixed eternally on hating God and committing evil. Humans can, up until the day of our death, change our wills because our nature is different from the nature of angels. But once we have died, our wills become permanent and fixed like the wills of the angels. So our wills will be eternally fixed on loving God or rejecting and hating Him.

As when the angels were given a choice to serve God or reject Him, something similar happened to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden:

Genesis 2:15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”

Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” 2 And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden; 3 but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” 4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, and he ate

Adam and Eve, when they were in the Garden, were sinless. Their minds, bodies, intellects and wills were perfect and without corruption. They had no concupiscence and no fallen nature that was attracted to sin. They were pure and their decision, the willful choice, to commit the Original Sin, to directly defy and disobey God and His command, was committed with perfect clarity and perfect knowledge that it was objectively wrong. This rejection of God’s will in the Original Sin was so catastrophic and so monumental that it caused the fall of mankind and causes every single person (other than Mary and Jesus) to be conceived with the stain of Original Sin. This is why King David said:

Psalm 51:5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.

This doesn’t mean that babies are guilty of their own sins, but that we are born with the stain of Original Sin. We all have a fallen nature and we have an attraction to sin (concupiscence). This doesn’t mean that we are not responsible for our sins or that we are not responsible for our rejection of God and His will. It means though that we have an attraction to sin that tempts us constantly to turn away from Him who is goodness itself.

All sin is a rejection of the will of God. His will is perfect and His will is perfectly loving. It always wants us to do what is good and holy. Pride is a rejection of the will of God and a demand to follow our own will instead. The sin of pride is involved in every sin we ever commit. Before we have actually begun to pull the trigger to murder someone, we made the mental choice to reject God’s will for us and instead choose our own will to commit evil. Pride begins every sin because it tells us to choose what we want instead of what He wants. Just like Satan in the Garden of Eden, our pride asks us if God REALLY meant what He said and tempts us to choose evil instead of good.

In our modern culture, society refuses to accept or acknowledge that sin even exists. Any evil thing that we have done is never our fault. We aren’t actually responsible for the evil we commit. It is always someone else’s fault or it was a mistake or accident that we made instead of a willful choice to do evil.

Sin is not accidental. Sin is not a mistake. Sin is a willful choice that we make to reject the will of God and favor our own will over His. Modern society says that sin is something we fall into instead of willfully choosing it over and over again. Sin is something that is chose, and since we freely choose to sin, we are freely choosing to being damned to Hell.

We aren’t responsible for accidents. We aren’t responsible for mistakes. Calling sin an accident or mistake is an attempt to avoid culpability and accountability for our sin. We want to avoid the consequences for our sin by denying our willful intention to commit the sin. If our evil was just an accident, then we didn’t willfully choose it. But that is a lie. We willfully, deliberately, obstinately and repeatedly choose to commit evil. And every single time we do it, our sin of pride is leading the way.

The sin of pride can only be fought with God’s grace. We must acknowledge that we have have willfully chosen to commit evil and stop trying to excuse or justify that evil. We must be honest for once about what we have done. Only by being honest about the problem can you start to work on correcting it.

We need God’s grace to fight against the sin of pride. We need the sacraments of the Catholic Church to bring God’s grace into our souls. We must then act upon the desire of God and conform ourselves to His will. To do this, we must practice and work on the virtue of humility. Humility is the opposite of pride and is how we fight against the sin of pride. As St. Peter warns about, we must always humble ourselves so we can avoid Satan and the temptations he brings.

1 Peter 5:6 Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that He may exalt you in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you. 8 Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, steadfast in your faith, for you know that your brothers and sisters in all the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering

The temptation in the Garden of Eden happened long ago, but the Devil and his demons are still fighting against God to try and tempt us humans to reject Him and His will as they did. They want us in Hell with them. They hate us with a fury we cannot comprehend. A soul that is sent to Hell does not reign there. The demons, who are fallen angels and vastly more powerful than humans, are in charge. If you refuse to repent of your sins and get sent to Hell, you will be at the mercy of those demons for eternity. You will never escape them and you will never beat them. They will tear at your flesh for eternity and torture you with a grievous hatred that has not even been seen on this earth.

So do not choose to go to Hell. Choose God and His will instead. Repent and go to Confession. Go to the sacraments frequently. Pray the Act of Contrition and the Rosary daily. Pray the Litany of Humility often. Do the good works that God has prepared for your. Produce the fruit of righteousness that He will for you to produce. Love God and your fellow man.

Litany of Humility

O Jesus, meek and humble of heart, Hear me.

From the desire of being esteemed, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being loved, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being extolled, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being honored, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being praised, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being preferred to others, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being consulted, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being approved, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being humiliated, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being despised, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of suffering rebukes, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being calumniated, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being forgotten, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being ridiculed, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being wronged, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being suspected, Deliver me, O Jesus.

That others may be loved more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be esteemed more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That, in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I may decrease, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be chosen and I set aside, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be praised and I go unnoticed, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be preferred to me in everything, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may become holier than I, provided that I may become as holy as I should, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.