profanation

profanation, desecration, sacrilege, blasphemy can all mean a violation or a misuse of something regarded as sacred.

Profanation applies to an irreverent outrage shocking to those who cherish and hold sacred the thing mistreated; although it may suggest base callousness, it often applies to vulgar intrusion or insensitive irreverence (as of vandals)

{

these sages attribute the calamity to a profanation of the sacred grove— Frazer

}

Desecration applies especially to any action whereby sacred character is impaired or lost; often it indicates loss of that character through defilement, often malicious or malign and culpable

{

desecration of the cathedrals by the invading barbarians

}

{

the last priest, feeling there was no work to be done in such a dreary outpost, burned the chapel in 1706 to prevent its desecration—Amer. Guide Series: Mich.

}

Sacrilege may refer technically to reception or administration of a religious sacrament by one unworthy; it refers commonly to any outrageous profanation

{

the execution was not followed by any sacrilege to the church or defiling of holy vessels— Cather

}

{

above all things they dread any contact with the spirits of the dead. Only a sorcerer would dare to commit such a sacrilege, an offense punishable with death— Frazer

}

Blasphemy (see also BLASPHEMY 1 ; compare blasphemous under IMPIOUS) may refer to any strong irreverence, often one involving or suggesting reviling, defying, mocking, or otherwise treating with indignity something sacred

{

he cooperated with me in sending the pious elders to unspeakable corners of hell; we arranged a wordless language of blasphemy and signaled to each other across the laps of the godly— Brace

}

Analogous words: defilement, pollution, contamination (see corresponding verbs at CONTAMINATE): debasement, vitiation, corruption, perversion (see corresponding verbs at DEBASE): violation, transgression, trespass (see BREACH)