Dorothy Sayers played down the deadly sin of Lust, which she saw as much less important than the Six Other Sins (such as Greed, Avarice and Envy, the “respectable sins”}. Too many people laboured under the delusion that for Christians matter and the body were evil: “For this misapprehension, St. Paul must bear some blame, St. Augustine of Hippo a good deal more, and Calvin a very great deal. But so long as the Church continues to teach the manhood of God and to celebrate the sacraments of the Eucharist and marriage, no living person should dare to say that matter and body are not sacred to her. She must insist strongly that the whole material universe is an expression and incarnation of the creative energy of God… For that reason, all good and creative handling of the material universe is holy and beautiful, and all abuse of the material universe is a crucifixion of the body of Christ”.

[Creed or Chaos, 1947]