I'm not too familiar with denial in the context of addictive behaviour but I think I understand well enough what you refer to to agree that yes, that would be an example of dishonesty towards self.
I work with recovering addicts so I know about denial. Denial is the king of liars and the strangest part is that even tho' intellectually one knows they are lying to themselves, the primitive self somehow believes the lie. It's kind of like 'love is blind', its the same process.
As you see from this, lying to oneself often is rather subconscious and not easy to detect by oneself. It's also not really dependent on religion - but for a more or less Christianity-specific example, a form of self-lie would be the suppression of sexuality in combination with moral justifications.
For the 'everyday christian' sex within a marriage* is encouraged and is seen as a great thing! The only way I could agree with you would be in the case of some Priests who take the 'total abstinence' concept to sometimes unhealthy, even criminal levels. I don't think I understand what you mean by a 'moral justification'. Of course we all know the stereotypical image of a christian looking down their noses at lesser moral beings. But those 'nose looker Christians' did not get their sexual morals from the bible. Christianity in general has been misrepresented in this area for many reasons. But it's a wrong view. For example the 'Song of Solomon' in the bible is about 'extravagant lovemaking, male and female oral sex, yearning and searching and hiding and finding, all between two unmarried people, one dark-skinned, and one light.' ** The Song of Sol. is one of many examples of Gods encouragement of us to enjoy sex and our bodies. So I can not agree with your critique.
Another, more general, example of lying to oneself would be to be dishonest to oneself about one's actual goals and values and adopting external goals and values from one's surroundings instead.
If I understand you correctly I believe in most cases there is no dishonesty. A Christian for example may forgo a easy comfortable life in exchange for working with the poor, but these are sacrifices and are like putting money in the spiritual bank to be redeemed at a later, hopefully much later date (after death) ! So I think its a choice Liu, not some kind of dishonesty. Seeing that you do not believe in spiritual, supernatural or metaphysical events etc may explain why the spiritual or supernatural seems bogus or we religious types placing trust where it will not be redeemed. I am willing to accept the risk that God does not exist, when I consider the alternative. Or maybe I misunderstood you?
LHP-religions (and I was referring to them in general, not to my own version of them alone) have self-improvement as basically spiritual goal, and therefore self-psychology, shadow-work or however you may call it is encouraged.
In combination with the aforementioned amorality, that necessarily leads to at least a tad more self-honesty.
Speaking from a personal position I can't agree in full. For example, say I want to do something that is forbidden by my faith. How could not doing it (even if I wanted to) lead to more self honesty? Ha ha now there are some things I haven't tried yet (1 or 2) but I believe doing them is an issue of personal courage not honesty. Or maybe I am in denial, lol?
Where do you think I'm referring to a supernatural realm?
I'm agnostic regarding the existence of spirits, but even if they exist I wouldn't assume them to be supernatural, but rather that all of existence is the same kind of natural.
In my world this life, this tangible world/universe is nothing really, a flash in the pan. I understand the universe as being a two tiered system, one physical where the laws of physics work just fine and everything is as it seems. The other world i realm, but that is anther thread. I was asking you if you were describing a spiritual issue of self honesty or were you referencing a problem experienced in this world. By your reply I now know you were referencing the tangible world. I apologize for my lack of skill in self expression and English grammar. Its so hard to put some of these things into words. Oh we do have an point of agreement on your last sentence. I think we are getting close to finding evidence of God or the spiritual realm with our science. Many paranormal events are not supernatural, rather they are supernormal imo.
notes
* Most scholars now say that the bible gives reference that sex outside marriage was normal.
** OOpsie Interracial sex? In the bible? Yes the bible was ahead of its time in many cases. What seems prudish or silly now was written in the time before we had antibiotics and the germ theory. So much of scripture was written for practical reasons, like don't eat pork, I would suggest that was because swine has the parasite trichinosis, God knew it but he just forbid pork. Good applied science!
If I mucked up anything or did not understand you please clarify! ~~~
: { >
