naenae110

This week in my scripture study, I was focusing on the topic of pride. As any good Book of Mormon reader, I instantly jumped to the pride cycle. In addition, I read Elder Ezra Taft Benson's talk "Beware of Pride" (https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1989/04/beware-of-pride?lang=eng). Studying this topic is hard because it requires a lot of self evaluation and a lot of humility to really see what is the truth. I found it interesting that Elder Benson said, "In the scriptures, there is no such thing as righteous pride- it is always considered a sin". It made me ponder about the different areas in our lives that we have pride- in our talents, in our family, in our alma maters, in our education, in our country. They seem like righteous pride, doesn't it? He goes on to discuss that the real root of pride isn't selfishness or haughtiness, but rather enmity (in hated opposition to something). I started thinking that really, when we are being prideful, it is because we are trying to compare ourselves or our lives to someone else's. For example, if you are too prideful in your country, it is because you think your country is better than every other country. It's an interesting take on pride that I hadn't thought of before. The deepest kind of pride comes from our opposition (enmity) with God's will. I want to end my blog post with this powerful paragraph by Elder Benson: " Our enmity toward God takes on many labels, such as rebellion, hard-heartedness, stiff-neckedness, unrepentant, puffed up, easily offended, and sign seekers. The proud wish God would agree with them. They aren’t interested in changing their opinions to agree with God’s". Here are some questions that are worth discussion: Do you think all kind of competitiveness or opposition results in a type of pride? Do you think that pride is different for every person? What oppositions in your life had led to pride?