Vatican Releases List Of New Sins, But Are They Clear On The Law Of Attraction?

The Vatican has come up with a new list of sins for the modern age. These include pollution, experiments in genetic manipulation, recreational drug use, and causing social and economic injustices, such as poverty, by amassing too much wealth (something the Church could be considered guilty of themselves).

In the past, the Church controlled it all by making themselves the only channel for messages from above and the enforcers of that law. But a recent study by Milan's Catholic University showed that 30 percent of Italian Catholics believed that there was no need for a priest to be God's intermediary. So how can the Church fight back, and make itself more relevant in today's world? By weighing in on what people are already worried about most. It's brilliant!

Godfather of Guilt Monsignor Gianfranco Girotti, the Regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, the Vatican body that issues decisions on matters of conscience and grants absolutions, said in an interview with the Vatican's L’Osservatore Romano newspaper, "While sin used to concern mostly the individual, today it has mainly a social resonance, due to the phenomenon of globalization". In case you were worried, Girotti said the Catholic Church continued to be concerned by good old-fashioned sin, such as pride, envy, lust, anger, greed, sloth and gluttony. That's good to know.

Making pollution a sin is long overdue. Really. Pope Benedict has been focused on protection of the environment recently, saying that climate change has become gravely important for the entire human race. (Did God tell him that? Or was it Al Gore?) Benedict and his predecessor John Paul have made the Vatican increasingly "green" by installing photovoltaic cells to produce electricity and hosting a scientific conference on global warming and climate change. This green angle is a step away from the traditional Biblical interpretation that humans were given everything on Earth, including the animals, to do with as we please.

Though we're happy that the Vatican has finally got with the environmental program, perhaps the Catholic Church isn't clear on how the Law of Attraction works. Guilt, long a tool of Catholic parents and teachers everywhere, puts the focus on negative things and feelings. But we enlightened Daily Mantra readers know that to truly make changes, we need to focus on the positive. So instead of listing new sins, let's make new commandments (we can run them by God for approval, we're just co-creating here).

Thou shalt love and honor the Earth, your planetary home.

Thou shalt marvel at the wonders of nature.

Thou shalt be grateful for mental clarity and intelligence.

Thou shalt enjoy sharing the wealth you attract.

Thou shalt enjoy the pleasures of the body as a means uplifting the spirit and sharing joy.

If sins are meant to be things that could send us to hell, and we think of hell as a consciousness or state of being, then we can use these new and old lists as guidelines to make us think twice and connect to our spiritual center before making decisions that might make our lives and our world a living hell.

"Sin" in Spanish means "without," so we can think of sins as decisions made without checking in with our own spiritual guidance and connection, or as mistakes made from missing the target of our highest and best choices.

So my friends, go and sin no more!

[Reprinted with kind permission from The Daily Mantra.]