Does Religion Promote Self-Enhancement?

Rather than fostering humility, does religiosity inflate pride instead?

Self-enhancement is when one is motivated to maintain or increase how positively one views oneself. The desire for self-enhancement seems to be a universal human motive, yet it has long been decried as a vice by major religions, especially Christianity, which preach the virtue of being humble and self-effacing. For example, Proverbs (16:18) states, “Pride goes before destruction,” and Thomas Aquinas described pride as the deadliest of sins…