The All Natural Opiate

One of my favorite movies is Devil’s Advocate and that is because it had to be the most accurate depiction of the devil ever. Al Pacino plays a marvelous devil. There were many great scenes in the movie, but one of my favorite moments is when satan revealed which sins of his was the favorite.


“Vanity is definitely my favorite sin…it’s so basic, self love, the all natural opiate.”

I love that line because its an absolutely brilliant description of what pride, vanity, self love, etc, does, and that is it dulls the perception of pain that you inflict upon others and yourself.

Opiates are any of the narcotics found in the opium poppy plant. How opiates work in the brain is they don’t block the pain messages, they change the subjective experience of the pain. This is why a person receiving morphine for pain may say that they still feel the pain but that it doesn’t bother them anymore.

When someone is full of self love, self importance, they can know that their actions are wrong. Know that they are hurting others, know they are going to wrong way, and still do it because they value themselves more so then what is right.

That is how a cheating husband can come home to a crying wife with lipstick on the collar.

That is how a mother can be knowingly be involved with a man that is abusing her children.

That is how a preacher can get up and minister to a congregation knowing he just smashed the church secretary in the office.

That is how a drug dealer can sale poison to his neighbors.

That is how a politician can pass a bill that he knows is going to throw the country into ruin.

That is why this world is in the mess that it is in today.

We live in a world today where anything goes, and that everyone is beautiful and perfect.  We encourage vanity, self love.  Now on the surface it sounds great, you should love yourself.  But when in reality the bible teaches us that the greatest commandments is to love God with all our hearts, mind, body, and soul.  And then we are suppose to love our neighbor as ourselves.   Love requires more than lip service.  Love requires action, because love will compel you to act upon it.