Envy doesn’t seem so deadly does it? It’s natural to feel a bit of envy isn’t it, when somebody has something better than you? Why is that such a big deal?

The French literary critic and philosopher Rene Girard writes about something he calls mimetic desire which is that desire at the root of our existence that is based on seeing and imitating others. In and of itself this mimetic desire is not evil. It’s the way we learn. We imitate others and we can learn good behavior that way or bad behavior.

When this essential form of envy goes bad however, is when it turns into resentment and the resentment begins to eat away at us. Before long the envy turns into not only desiring to have what the other person has, or to be who the other person is, but we also begin to blame that other person for having what they have and being who they are.

Ironically, although we blame them, at the root of envy is the desire to be like them. We want to take their place and be them. This envy therefore is a twisted kind of love. We love the one we envy and we hate the one we envy and we blame the one we envy for having what we want and being who we want to be.

When we start to blame them, the resentment against them becomes even more bitter because we feel wounded and the victims of injustice.

Then the resentment leads us to make a values flip.  The envy caused us to view the other as the privileged and therefore the better person. They have more than we have and are more privileged than we are so they must be a better a more blessed person than we are. But when the values flip happens we suddenly percieve ourselves as the good person. Why? Because we are poorer and less advantaged. This is what Nietzsche called the slave revolt of morality, and he despised it because he said it made weakness a virtue. When the values flip takes place we see ourselves, not the envied one, as superior and this leads to virtue signaling, a victim mentality and what I have called crybaby bullies–those who bully others by weaponizing their victim status.

Envy is a deadly sin because, unchecked, it will lead to violence. How so? Well, when it leads us to blame the person we envy, eventually we will nurture resentment and feel the need to destroy them. It is there in the story of the first murder. Cain envied his brother Abel, resented him and finally rose up to kill him.

What is the virtue that counters envy?  It must be charity enacted in kindness. Charity wishes the best for the other person. Envy wishes the worst. Charity is a supernatural gift so, while we can practice it through kindness, for it to really be transformative we must pray to receive this gift.