1. Pride
2. Envy
3. Gluttony
4. Lust
5. Anger
6. Greed
7. Sloth

Unchanged for 1,500 years, this list was due for an update. Considering only 40% of Catholics in Italy even make it to confession these days, the Vatican has finally realized that maybe, just maybe times have changed.

Wait just a minute though. Don’t think for a minute that this gets you off the hook. We’re not talking about replacing the old list. No folks, this is a whole new set of deadly sins to add to your worries. Why? Cause according to Monsignor Gianfranco Girotti, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, there’s a “decreasing sense of sin,” in the modern globalized world (ya think?) and in order to address the “rather individualistic dimension” of the old set of sins, “the sins of today have a social resonance as well…”

Can you guess what the seven new deadly sins are?

To avoid your one-way ticket to hell, read on!
Note: IMPORTANT UPDATE at the end of this article…

First, let’s recap the basics: The Catholic Church divides sins into venial sins and mortal (deadly) sins. While the former ones are not seriously wrong and therefore forgivable, the latter threaten the soul with eternal damnation unless absolved before death through confession and penitence. Note that the original list only serves as a guide and is hardly finite, seeing as mortal sins include anything that gravely violates the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes – we’re talking murder, contraception, abortion, perjury and lust to name a few. Immediately after death, the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell…so says the Catholic Church. Eastern Catholics are a little easier on the soul and don’t categorize sins, nor do they believe that those who die in a state or sin are automatically condemned to eternal damnation.

The list of new deadly sins, published yesterday in the official daily Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano:

1. Genetic modification
2. Human experimentation
3. Environmental pollution (wow…hell’s gonna be one crowded place)
4. Social injustice
5. Causing poverty
6. Excessive accumulation of wealth (uh oh…Trump’s in for it now)
7. Taking or dealing drugs (looks like marijuana city’s busted)

Can they BE more vague? Apparently the Catholic Church is in quite the desperate need to fill those confession booths eh?

Abortion is also ranking quite high up there on the list of Vatican concerns, as is pedophilia (or wait, was that hypocrisy?).

For those that are curious, here are the original sins and the associated punishments (sourced from the illustrated book Devils, Demons and Witchcraft by Ernst and Johanna Lehner):

Pride – Broken on the wheel
Envy – Put in freezing water
Gluttony – Forced to eat rats, toads, and snakes
Lust – Smothered in fire and brimstone
Anger – Dismembered alive
Greed – Put in cauldrons of boiling oil
Sloth – Thrown in snake pits

Trivia: You know the seven old and now new deadly sins. Does anyone know what Christians refer to as the seven holy virtues? Leave your answer in the comments section!

IMPORTANT UPDATE:

Alright people! I knew there was something fishy about this announcement. As our commenter Anya outlines below, it just doesn’t make sense…and here’s why:

The Forum: Not “new sins” but an old media blind spot
by Phil Lawler, special to CWNews.com

Mar. 10, 2008 (CWNews.com) – When he finished his interview with L’Osservatore Romano, Archishop Gianfranco Girotti probably thought that his main message had been an appeal to Catholics to use the sacrament of Confession. Little did he know that the English-language news media would play the interview as a newly revised list of sins.

Archbishop Girotti, the regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, spoke to the Vatican newspaper about “new forms of social sin” in our era. He mentioned such transgressions as destructive research on human embryos, degradation of the environment, and drug trafficking. Within hours, dozens of media sources were suggesting that the Vatican had radically revised the Ten Commandments, issuing a list of “new sins.”

As usual, a British newspaper leapt to the forefront with the most sensational and misleading coverage. The Daily Telegraph made the preposterous claim that Archbishop Girotti’s list replaced the traditional Catholic understanding of the seven deadly sins…Get the whole story