Introduction
I have previously written about what it is that moves us humans. Within philosophy, there are multiple answers to this question. In that earlier writing, I argued that the movements within man can broadly be divided into higher and lower ones. On the higher side, we find our capacity for sacrifice, truth, love, self-giving, and virtue. On the lower side, we find animalistic desires and the various vices which arise when our desires become disordered as a consequence of original sin. I concluded that it is good for human beings to strengthen the former and minimise the latter.
This is hardly a groundbreaking conclusion. It has been central to moral thought for more than two millennia, especially in light of God’s revelation through the Old Testament Prophets and, ultimately, through Jesus Christ. Nevertheless, several questions remain. What does it actually mean to aim at something? How do multiple aims relate to each other? What stands at the top of our hierarchy of aims? Where do virtues fit into this structure? And what happens to that structure when we sin?
These are the questions I want to explore in this essay.
What is aiming?
In its simplest sense, aiming means directing oneself towards a particular goal or end. Yet an aim does more than give us something to pursue. It also changes the way we perceive the world.
Suppose that I want to write something. I take a piece of paper and a pen and begin to write. Because of my aim, the pen appears as a writing tool and the paper as something upon which my thoughts can be preserved. In themselves, however, they are simply combinations of materials. They only possess this particular meaning for me because of what I am trying to do. Without the aim of writing, they would be ordinary objects in my surroundings.
An aim therefore organises the world around us. Once we direct ourselves towards something, our surroundings begin to appear as a collection of things which may help us, obstruct us, or remain irrelevant to us. Aiming does not merely present an end-goal. It shapes attention and perception.
This also explains part of what people experience when they speak about manifestation. Once the magical claims are removed, manifestation often consists in repeatedly directing one’s attention towards a particular end. The world then begins to appear in relation to that end. Opportunities which were previously unnoticed suddenly become visible, while obstacles which had once seemed insignificant demand attention. The world itself has not necessarily changed; the structure of perception has.
Our aims therefore influence what we notice, what we ignore, what we experience as useful, and what we experience as threatening. Over time, they can even alter the kind of world we seem to inhabit. Our aims do not merely determine where we are going. They also shape what we see along the way.
Ends, means, and the pyramid of aims
Before examining the relationship between multiple aims, we need to distinguish between an end, a means, and an action. An end is the thing for the sake of which we act. A means is something chosen in order to reach that end. An action is the concrete movement by which the means is used or the end is pursued.
Suppose that I want to pass an examination. Passing the examination is my immediate aim. Studying is one of the means by which I hope to reach it, while reading, making notes, and practising questions are the concrete actions involved. Yet passing the examination is probably not my final aim. I may want to pass because I want to complete a degree, develop my abilities, find meaningful work, discover truth, or fulfil a vocation.
This shows that one aim can function both as an end and as a means. Passing an examination is an end in relation to studying, while also serving as a means towards completing a degree. Completing a degree may then serve another aim above it. For the sake of clarity, I will call an aim which contains or orders other aims beneath it a meta-aim. An aim which is ordered towards something higher will be called a sub-aim. Most aims are both at the same time, depending on their place within the larger structure.
Human life contains many aims at once. We pursue friendship, knowledge, rest, success, pleasure, love, security, recognition, and countless other goods. Because these aims do not exist independently of one another, they can be represented as a hierarchy or pyramid. We can uncover this structure by repeatedly asking “why?”. Why did I study? Because I wanted a good grade. Why did I want a good grade? Because I want to complete my degree. Why do I want a degree? Because I want to develop my abilities and use them well. As we continue asking the question, the answers become more general and more difficult. Eventually we arrive at the great questions of human life: what should I ultimately love, what should everything else serve, and what kind of life is worth living?
At the bottom of the pyramid, we find simple and concrete aims. Higher up, we find broader aims such as education, vocation, family, truth, service, and holiness. At the top, we reach the most fundamental orientation of the person. The image of a pyramid is obviously a simplification. Human life is rarely as neat as a diagram, and one action may serve several aims at once. Nevertheless, the image remains useful because it shows that not every aim has equal authority. Lower aims receive their direction and meaning from the aims above them.
This also means that the higher an aim stands, the more influence it has over the rest of life. A change near the bottom may alter one action. A change near the top can alter almost everything.
Virtue and the hierarchy
At this point, an important distinction must be made. It may initially seem reasonable to place virtues such as courage, justice, humility, temperance, mercy, obedience, and purity within the higher levels of the pyramid. They are certainly greater goods than comfort, status, pleasure, or immediate satisfaction. Yet virtues are not, strictly speaking, aims.
An aim is an end towards which a person directs himself. A virtue is a stable disposition by which he is able to act well. The Catechism describes virtue as a “habitual and firm disposition to do the good” (CCC 1803). Virtues are stable perfections of the intellect and will which govern actions, order passions, and guide conduct according to reason and faith.
A virtue is therefore more than an individual good action. It is a quality formed within the person which enables him to recognise, desire, and perform the good readily and consistently. A courageous person possesses a stable disposition which enables him to face danger in the right manner. A just person is disposed to give God and neighbour what is due to them. A temperate person is able to order bodily desires according to reason. A prudent person can recognise the good within a particular situation and choose the right means of attaining it.
Virtues should therefore not be imagined as separate blocks within the pyramid. They operate throughout the whole structure. The pyramid represents the hierarchy of aims, while virtue represents the quality and stability with which the person acts upon those aims.
Without virtue, a person may recognise a good aim and still fail to pursue it consistently. He may know that prayer is good and repeatedly abandon it for comfort. He may believe that he should speak truthfully and lie when honesty becomes costly. He may understand that lust damages love and still give himself over to immediate pleasure. Virtue stabilises the person in the pursuit of the good, whereas vice disposes him towards repeated disorder.
This does not mean that virtue can never become an aim in any sense. A person can aim to become more patient, courageous, humble, or generous. In that case, the acquisition or strengthening of a virtue becomes an aim. The individual acts through which patience is practised serve the formation of a stable disposition. Once that virtue has been formed, it becomes a quality within the person rather than merely an external goal.
This distinction also applies to the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. These virtues are given by God and help us direct our lives towards Him. Through faith, we believe in God and accept what He has revealed. Through hope, we trust in His promises and desire to be with Him. Through charity, we love God above all things and love our neighbour as ourselves. These virtues are therefore not separate aims within the pyramid. They enable us to pursue the highest aim properly: loving God and loving others.
We can therefore describe the structure more precisely. At the top of the pyramid stands the highest aim: to love God with the whole of our being and to love our neighbour as ourselves. Beneath this stand subordinate aims and goods. At the lower levels stand concrete means and actions. Virtue operates throughout the whole structure, enabling the person to pursue these aims properly.
Clarification on the highest aim
We can now further examine the central question: what should stand at the top of the hierarchy of aims?
This is not merely a theoretical issue. Our highest aims influence the rest of our lives through a kind of trickle-down effect. When a high meta-aim changes, the sub-aims beneath it often change as well. This is why philosophy, theology, and religion are not simple additions to an otherwise unchanged life. They concern the principles which order everything else. A genuine conversion to faith does not simply add prayer and church to one’s schedule. It changes the meaning of work, friendship, sexuality, suffering, ambition, discipline, leisure, and death.
At the level of what people consciously or unconsciously choose to serve, the highest aim differs between individuals. We can often approach a person’s highest aim by continuing to ask why he acts as he does. Eventually, we reach something which is no longer justified by reference to another aim above it. It stands as the thing for the sake of which the rest is done.
In the modern world, happiness, freedom, authenticity, power, progress, and meaning often occupy this place. Each of these points towards something real. Happiness concerns well-being, freedom concerns the ability to act, authenticity concerns personal integrity, power concerns effectiveness, progress concerns development, and meaning concerns significance. The problem arises when one of these limited goods is treated as the final good.
Happiness can be reduced to comfort. Freedom can become self-will. Authenticity can turn into narcissism. Power can become domination. Progress can become movement without a destination. Meaning can become an emotional substitute for truth. These goods are unable to carry the weight which is placed upon them when they become absolute.
Man cannot simply invent his own final purpose. He can invent projects, careers, lifestyles, ambitions, and forms of entertainment. He cannot create the ultimate reason for his own existence. That purpose existed before he became conscious enough to express it. God created man with a purpose, whether the individual accepts it or not.
The first paragraph of the Catechism of the Catholic Church describes human life as being directed towards knowing and loving God. CCC 1 states that God created man to share in His blessed life and calls him to seek Him, know Him, and love Him with all his strength. The purpose of human life is therefore given to us. It is also relational. Man is called to love God and enter into communion with Him.
Christ expresses this clearly in Matthew 22. When asked which commandment is the greatest, He responds:
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.”
The highest aim of human life is therefore to love God with the totality of our being and to love our neighbour as ourselves. God Himself is the being towards whom this aim is directed. He is the object of our love, worship, faith, and hope. The highest aim is the right orientation of the human person towards Him: to know Him, love Him, obey Him, and share in His life.
Love of neighbour belongs inseparably to this orientation. Christ does not present it as an optional addition. The second commandment flows from the first and forms part of the same rightly ordered life. The top of the pyramid can therefore be expressed as follows: to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind, and to love our neighbour as ourselves. Every legitimate lower aim must ultimately be ordered beneath this.
What stands beneath the highest aim?
Once the top has been identified, the structure beneath it becomes clearer. The highest subordinate aims include knowing God, worshipping Him, obeying His will, becoming holy, serving one’s neighbour, fulfilling one’s vocation, seeking truth, practising virtue, and building communion with others. Beneath these stand more particular aims such as forming a family, completing an education, doing honest work, caring for the body, helping a friend, learning to pray, understanding Scripture, fulfilling a promise, or resisting temptation. Concrete actions then occupy the lower levels.
Each lower aim receives its moral direction from the aims above it. Study becomes good when it serves truth, vocation, service, and love. Work becomes rightly ordered when it serves genuine human flourishing rather than greed or pride. Rest has its proper place when it restores us for our duties and relationships. Even ordinary activities can participate in the highest aim. Work can become service, study can become love of truth, marriage can become self-gift, and suffering can become participation in Christ.
However, this order does not become real merely because we understand it intellectually. It must be embodied in action and stabilised through virtue. A person may say that loving God and neighbour is his highest aim while organising his life around status, money, pleasure, or approval. It is possible to profess one hierarchy and live according to another. Virtue matters because it makes the true hierarchy increasingly stable within the person.
Sin as disorder
We can now consider what happens when the hierarchy is disrupted. If man is created to love God and neighbour, how can sinful aims arise at all?
Sin does not create a new true purpose for man. He remains created to love God and neighbour even when he rejects that purpose. Sin disorders the way he moves towards the good. This disorder can take several forms. A person may pursue an evil end, treat a subordinate good as though it were the highest good, pursue a legitimate good excessively, choose an evil means, or refuse a good which he is morally obliged to pursue.
Sin is therefore broader than simply having a wrong aim. Nevertheless, disordered aiming remains central to many sins. A lower or partial good breaks loose from its proper place and is pursued apart from God, reason, or love.
Sin is generally chosen under the appearance of some good. A man lies because he wants safety, admiration, advantage, or escape. Lust promises pleasure and intimacy. Greed promises security and control. Pride promises greatness without obedience. The thing desired often contains some genuine goodness in its original design. The disorder lies in the way it is pursued, the place it is given, or the means chosen to obtain it.
This is one of the ways in which Satan tempts. Evil is concealed beneath the appearance of satisfaction, knowledge, freedom, comfort, justice, or love. The inner structure of sin is often a good desired in the wrong way, through the wrong means, in the wrong proportion, or against a higher good.
This structure is already visible in Genesis 3. The serpent presents the forbidden fruit as “good for food”, “pleasing to the eyes”, and “desirable for gaining wisdom”. Food, beauty, and wisdom are goods. The sin lies in seizing them apart from obedience to God. Man pursues an apparent good while refusing the order established by his Creator.
The Catechism describes sin as a “failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods” (CCC 1849). Sin is therefore often a perverse attachment to something which possesses a limited goodness. CCC 1850 describes it as a revolt against God through the will to become “like gods”, knowing and determining good and evil. The sinner attempts to determine the order of good and evil for himself rather than receiving it from God. CCC 415 makes the same point by saying that Adam “sought to attain his goal apart from” God.
This also explains why a good end does not justify evil means. A person may desire to protect his reputation and choose lying, or desire to help his family and choose theft. The end contains some goodness, yet the chosen means remains morally wrong. Catholic moral theology therefore considers the object of the act, the intention of the acting person, and the circumstances. The lower levels of the hierarchy cannot contradict the higher ones. A means which violates truth, justice, or charity cannot genuinely serve love of God and neighbour.
Original sin, vice, and false peaks
If man is created for the good, why does he so easily pursue goods in a disordered way? The Catholic answer begins with the wounded condition of human nature after the fall. Man has free will, but because of original sin, his ability to recognise and choose the good has been weakened. His intellect can become darkened, his will weakened, and his passions disordered. He remains directed towards the good, yet he struggles to recognise and pursue it properly.
The passions are a good example. The Catechism states that the passions are neither good nor evil in themselves. They receive their moral quality according to whether they are governed by reason and will and integrated into virtue (CCC 1767). Hunger, sexual desire, anger, fear, and the desire for honour all have a proper place within human life. They become disordered when they attempt to rule without receiving direction from reason, virtue, and God.
The language of idolatry helps clarify what then happens. When a created good takes the place which belongs to the highest aim, a false hierarchy is formed. Pleasure, approval, power, romance, wealth, comfort, knowledge, political victory, or the self can become supreme. The sinner installs the wrong thing at the peak, which results in a messed up pyramid.
This is why sin is both irrational and understandable. It is irrational because no finite good can fulfil the whole human person. It remains understandable because the object pursued often contains some genuine goodness. Lust takes the good of sexual union and detaches it from charity, fidelity, marriage, and self-gift. Greed takes the good of material security and detaches it from justice and generosity. Pride takes the desire for excellence and detaches it from humility, gratitude, and obedience. In each case, something lower rises against something higher.
Repeated sin then forms vice. The Catechism teaches that sin creates a proclivity to sin and produces vice through repetition (CCC 1865). Repeated lying does more than produce a number of lies; it forms a liar. Repeated lust forms a person who increasingly perceives others as objects of consumption. Repeated pride creates someone who finds humility, correction, and obedience increasingly unbearable.
Because aims shape perception, vice also changes the way the world appears. Conscience becomes clouded, judgement becomes corrupted, and evil begins to hide its evilness. The true good may start to feel distant, unattractive, or threatening. Sin trains the soul to mis-aim.
Virtue produces the opposite movement. Truthful actions strengthen honesty. Acts of self-restraint strengthen temperance. Courageous actions strengthen fortitude. The virtuous person begins to recognise the good more readily, choose it more freely, and perform it more consistently. A person is therefore formed by the way in which he pursues his aims. Through repeated action, we gradually become a particular kind of person.
Grace and the healing of the hierarchy
This is why the Christian answer cannot be reduced to moral rules. Sin affects the intellect, will, passions, habits, loves, and perceptions of the person. What is needed is something far bigger: redemption. The entire hierarchy must be reordered, the heart healed, the intellect illuminated, the will strengthened, and the passions integrated.
This is what Christ comes to accomplish. He reconciles us to God, gives grace to the wounded soul, and restores the proper order of love. Man cannot fully heal himself through intellect, discipline, or willpower alone. The disorder reaches deeper than confusion and belongs to the wounded condition of human nature. The answer is grace.
Grace does not make man passive. God acts first by calling, healing, forgiving, strengthening, and reordering. Man is then called to respond. Grace heals and perfects human freedom, making it capable of moving more fully towards the good for which it was created
This is why the sacramental life of the Church is central. The sacraments are concrete means through which Christ acts and gives grace. In confession, the sinner is reconciled and forgiven. In the Eucharist, the soul is nourished by Christ Himself. Through prayer, examination of conscience, fasting, penance, resistance to temptation, and the avoidance of sin, man cooperates with the grace he has received.
The Christian answer is therefore cooperation with grace. We receive what we cannot give ourselves, and then we act from that gift.
How to integrate this knowledge
The practical consequence of this investigation is that we should become more conscious of the hierarchy according to which we are already living. We can ask what we are aiming at, which higher aim it serves, whether our chosen means are morally good, which passions influence our judgement, which virtues are required, and what kind of person our repeated actions are forming.
These questions do not save us. They can, however, reveal where our lives have become disordered and where grace must be received. They may also expose false peaks within our own pyramid. We may say that love of God stands at the top while our daily choices reveal that comfort, approval, resentment, ambition, or pleasure actually governs us. We may pursue apparently good ends through means which contradict the love we claim to serve.
Examining the hierarchy is therefore an act of honesty before God. We bring our aims, habits, desires, and actions before Him and ask that they be purified and reordered.
Summary and conclusion
Aiming initially appears to be a simple concept. It means having a goal and acting towards it. Yet an aim also changes the way the world appears. It makes certain things useful, certain things obstructive, certain things meaningful, and certain things almost invisible. The aim organises perception.
Human life is structured by a hierarchy of ends. Small actions point towards larger purposes, and larger purposes point towards still higher goods. This makes the question of the highest aim unavoidable. The modern world offers happiness, freedom, authenticity, power, progress, and meaning as possible answers. Each contains something real, though each becomes dangerous when treated as absolute. They are too small to carry the full weight of human life.
The Christian answer is that man’s highest aim is to love God with all his heart, soul, and mind, and to love his neighbour as himself. God is the being towards whom this aim is directed. He is the one whom we are called to know, love, worship, and obey. Every lower aim must therefore be ordered beneath the love of God and neighbour.
Virtues are stable dispositions which enable us to pursue those aims rightly. Virtue stabilises right aiming, while vice results in habitual disorder. Sin occurs when the hierarchy is disrupted through a false end, a disordered attachment, an evil means, or a refusal of the good. Repeated sin then forms vice and gradually changes the person’s perception of reality.
This is why man needs grace. Through Christ, the wounded person can be reconciled to God and gradually reordered towards the highest aim. Man cannot stop aiming. Even when he claims to have no highest aim, he is still serving something. The question is whether that thing is worthy of being served.
When we aim at something too small, our lives gradually shrink around it. When love of God and neighbour stands at the top, every lower good can begin to find its proper place. Work can become service, study can become love of truth, discipline can become love, suffering can become participation, and friendship can become communion. Even the smallest action can become part of a life ordered towards eternity.
Aiming becomes our reality. To aim rightly is to begin seeing rightly, choosing rightly, loving rightly, and living rightly. A big part of the Christian life is the lifelong process of allowing God to take every scattered, wounded, and misdirected aim within us and order it towards love of Him and love of others.
For in the end, man becomes what he repeatedly loves, chooses, and serves.