Spiritual reading: Genesis 4:1-16
CCC #2539: Envy: sadness at the sight of another’s goods and the immoderate desire to acquire them for oneself, even unjustly. When one wishes grave harm to a neighbour it is mortal sin.
Envy is a sin because it goes against the 10th commandment: You shall not covet anything that is your neighbour’s.
Basically, envy is wanting something that others have but we don’t have. Greed is always wanting something more and never satisfied. Illustrate with ABCD_FGHI. Both are interconnected and are a sin of excess. Desire is good, but extreme desire to the extent of harming others I bad.
Greed is actually the root cause of other sins: lust, gluttony, envy, pride.
Greed and envy cause us to hate others: hate our superiors who excel better than us, hate our equal as they compete with us, hate our inferiors as they strive to equal us. All these make us sad, discontent to others and difficult to deal with people à no friends; torturing ourselves
From spiritual reading: Cain killed Abel because Cain was envious of Abel’s accepted sacrifices. Cain suffered great consequences for his sin, but God still loves him as he was prevented from being killed in foreign land.
Other examples: Gen 37: Brothers of Joseph sold him as a slave because they are envious of Jacob’s love for Joseph. They suffered consequences: famine, but our all-merciful God still love them as God used Joseph to give them wheat, allowing them to survive through the famine.
Opposite of Greed and Envy is Charity and Kindness:
1. Give to the poor. We try to be more generous in giving. Our time, talents, money and possessions are all precious gifts from God. Freely receive, freely give! True generosity doesn’t impoverish, but it enriches! God richly rewards those who give generously. We cannot outsmart God in generosity: look to God as our role model. By doing this we strive to live simply. Try to let go and give up things we do not really need. Train us to not desire excessive things. Philosopher: going shopping, sees many luxuriant things, don’t say I want them, but realise that I can still live without these things that I don’t have, so they are unnecessary.
2. Rejoice with other’s achievements: learn from others: be envious of the right things: sb who has a strong faith, who is faithful, who is charitable. Don’t desire a bigger house, a nicer car, a more prestigious position, higher salary, better looks, more fame prestige and power
3. Make a list of the blessings that we have received from god so far.
4. Believe that only God Himself can satisfy our thirst, desire, longing, wants. Desire is a gift from God, and we are made from God who is infinite. Therefore we are given an infinite longing so that we long for God and not for the finite things of the world because the infinite heart can only be satisfied with the infinite God. Ask for the grace to realise that God alone is enough for me. All that we have is from God. God has given us the necessary things that we need to survive, there is no need to be envy or greedy for more. Accept our own reality with trust in God. God knows better than we do: Rm 9:20-22: But who are you my friend to talk back to God? A clay pot does not ask the man who made it, “Why did you make me like this?” After all, the man who makes the pots has the right to use the clay as he wishes, one for special occasion, one for ordinary use.
Ask the Lord to fill our hearts with a spirit of generosity and charity, and joy in sharing what we have with others.