Sloth is my worst sin.
My students and I were in a discussion about evil. More specifically, we were looking at the well-worn question of whether or not morality is dependent on God’s existence or not. In order to answer the question, we looked at the different levels of morality: absolute morality, divine morality, human morality, and culture/government morality.
One part of the discussion involves whether or not an action can be moral if it does not involve anyone other than one’s self, ie, if a person is not violating anyone else’s rights, can an act still be moral or immoral. An answer of ‘yes’ implies that one believes morality exists on a higher level than culture/government, and possibly human as well.
Many of my students seemed annoyed that I would suggest something like ‘sloth’ or masturbation would be considered immoral. The concept did not make any sense to them, as far as I could see.
But classifying sloth as a type of immoral behavior makes sense. It is an indulgence that prohibits the “sinner” (although I would only use this word metaphorically) from reaching good, excellent goals. And when those goals are concerned with the ever-growing advancement of humanity and a benevolent peace, ought not those things be considered moral? And self-growth is always a good that could be used for the good of humanity, or at least a larger community.
But, suppose an aspiring evil tyrant were “slothful.” Would this be a sin, since his goals are counter to the goals of humanity? In one sense, yes, but in another, no. It is not a sin against humanity for the evil tyrant to be slothful. But, it is counter to his own goals, and so it is sinful for his self. Being infected with sloth for an evil person (in this case meaning someone who strives against the goods of humanity) is the same as it is for a good person.
Natural Causes 