sacrilegious
adjective
sac·ri·le·gious
ˌsa-krə-ˈli-jəs 
also
-ˈlē-
: committing or characterized by sacrilege : having or showing a lack of proper respect for a sacred person, place, or object
sacrilegious acts
It is difficult for religiously committed persons to acknowledge that their sacred texts are prone to sacrilegious uses.—
Mary C. Boys
—often used in an exaggerated way in contexts unrelated to religionMary C. BoysIt would be sacrilegious to cut down such beautiful trees.
Chilling your red wines may seem sacrilegious to some, and downright odd to others.—Tess Rose Lampert
Tess Rose Lampert
sacrilegiously
adverb
In the center of the rich red carpet was a black and gold Louis Quinze table, a lovely antique, now sacrilegiously desecrated with marks of glasses and the scars of cigar-stumps.
—Arthur Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan Doyle
sacrilegiousness
noun
… these examples of … insensitivity to (if not sacrilegiousness or profanation of) the deeply held beliefs of some 200 million-plus Americans.
—Quin Hilyer
Quin Hilyer
Examples of sacrilegious in a Sentence
a sacrilegious, obscene joke—and told in church at that!
Recent Examples on the Web
Alfie, who’s either being willfully obtuse or radically uncompromising, sees nothing sacrilegious in Wilde’s one-act tragedy.
—Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times, 21 May 2025
Surely, there’s something utterly sacrilegious about laughing hysterically at actors giving God the middle finger.
—Michael James Rocha, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 June 2025
Some of this may seem sacrilegious to the F1 fans who got into the sport because of Emerson Fittipaldi, Alain Prost, and Aryton Senna, rather than Drive to Survive, but there’s no denying that the Miami Grand Prix is a success.
—Bryan Hood, Robb Report, 8 May 2025
According to the first-century Jewish philosopher Philo and the historian Josephus, Pilate had his soldiers carry objects that honored Roman emperors into Jerusalem, which Jewish residents saw as sacrilegious.
—Nathanael Andrade, The Conversation, 11 Apr. 2025
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Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times, 21 May 2025
Surely, there’s something utterly sacrilegious about laughing hysterically at actors giving God the middle finger.
—Michael James Rocha, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 June 2025
Some of this may seem sacrilegious to the F1 fans who got into the sport because of Emerson Fittipaldi, Alain Prost, and Aryton Senna, rather than Drive to Survive, but there’s no denying that the Miami Grand Prix is a success.
—Bryan Hood, Robb Report, 8 May 2025
According to the first-century Jewish philosopher Philo and the historian Josephus, Pilate had his soldiers carry objects that honored Roman emperors into Jerusalem, which Jewish residents saw as sacrilegious.
—Nathanael Andrade, The Conversation, 11 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for sacrilegious
Cite this Entry
“Sacrilegious.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sacrilegious. Accessed 31 Jul. 2025.
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