The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Pride vs. Dignity

I find that Pride and Dignity are very similar, only a different focus, where Pride is an inflated sense of worth through ones own ego, and dignity is a sense of worth through a very personal way, coming solely God-given. Or another more easy way to put it, pride is about the ego, and dignity is about the person. Where the difference is a person cannot be defined, categorized, or fully explained, where an ego can be grasped, more of a shadow of a person.

So my point on dignity and pride is that there is a fine line. I find that one can easily be tempted into pride to compensate for a lack of a sense of dignity. Other times, it can be difficult to differentiate between a spirit of pride or dignity. Since self righteousness is popular trap for Christians to fall into, no matter how charitable. I find that even Universalists can fall into self righteousness and pride. And I can understand why, due to Universal Salvation is the highest form of justice, in the way it transcends mere retribution for being bad and rewards for being good.

For example, compromise can be either a dignified or prideful behavior, in one sense of being true to yourself as God created you, or being so self righteous that you will not even consider anything buy . Or a sense of humility can be prideful or dignifying, with one form of false humility of being “humbler than thou” or a sense of being more aware of how depraved and deserving of hell they are, or a kind of dignifying humility that acknowledges they are not of themselves, and the finiteness of themselves without God.

I find this challenge is best explored in the tv show “Breaking Bad”. With the characters Walt and Hank, both being prideful in two different ways, with some dignity issues mixed in. With Walt, he is living an undignified life of having his intelligence in chemistry patronized, and similar to the popular working class archetype of someone who has to sacrifice their dignity just to get by. Where Walts pride in getting into the drug business is to compensate for the lack of dignity in never doing what he was good at, and having to work two jobs, including one dead end job.

Now Hank on the other hand is a sense of pride where he is very self righteous about his position, and portrays many characteristics of belittling those who do not fit his standards. Plus, the whole political matter of the war on drugs and the moral debate over whether non-defensive forms of aggression are justified in order to punish immorality, or to force people to be virtuous. Now I can see how it can be debatable whether Hank was acting on prideful impulses, or acting on some uncompromising dignity. Like a kind of “I am going to stick to what I believe in, whether others like it or not”. And yes, I know its more about Hanks obsession with Heisenberg before any known crimes were committed.

Well, Joe, here are three immediate sources for finding answers:

Quora - What is the difference between pride and dignity?
Yahoo Answers - What is the difference between Dignity and Pride?
Catholic Answers - What is the difference between pride and dignity?

I find that the difficulty is deciphering whether ones behavior is prideful or dignified. Since they both involve an uncompromising stance of your ground. Since on one hand, standing your ground could be a sense of self righteousness, and refusal to listen to others. Or its just being true to yourself, or acting with integrity, even if under pressure.

On one hand, I cannot help but think that blatant disrespect towards others, and an unwillingness to stop is just purely prideful. Like I would not say tyranny, bigotry, or violence is dignified, only prideful. But other things can be dignified, like resistance, non-conformity, ect.

I suggest that “pride” (in the negative sense) is the characteristic of feeling superior to others in some way, and that “dignity” is a stance that will not permit others to dominate you.

I was wondering about the practice of refusing bad company. Since there can be a spirit of pride in an attitude that one sees themself too holy and good to be in the presence of a certain vice. The other spirit of dignity is being able to avoid company that could be harmful to oneself. Like escaping an abusive relationship, avoiding hanging out at bars, turning down a job at a negative company, or changing churches.