impious

American  

[im-pee-uhs, im-pahy-] / ˈɪm pi əs, ɪmˈpaɪ- /

adjective

1. not pious or religious; lacking reverence for God, religious practices, etc.; irreligious; ungodly.

   Synonyms:

   irreverent, blasphemous, sacrilegious

2. disrespectful.

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impious British  

/ ˈɪmpɪəs /

adjective

1. lacking piety or reverence for a god; ungodly

2. lacking respect; undutiful

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Other Word Forms

• impiously adverb
• impiousness noun

Etymology

Origin of impious

1565–75; < Latin impius. See im- ², pious

Explanation

To be impious is to be disrespectful of god or duty. When someone is being impious they are doing things that their church, synagogue, temple, mosque, school principal, government or parents would find unacceptable. When you don’t show reverence for religion or god, you are impious. The adjective impious is related to the word piety, which means religious reverence. To be impious is to be without piety. Being impious is similar to being blasphemous, but it’s a little more passive to be impious, while blasphemy is more actively insulting. Also, when you act out against tradition or dutifulness, you could be considered impious. If you dodge a military draft, you will likely be considered impious.

Example Sentences

Having conferred upon Franco’s touchdown its name for 11 o’clock news viewers to embrace, I accept neither credit nor, should you hold the moniker to be impious, blame.”

From Washington Post • Dec. 23, 2022

Hugo, not a pious figure but a Republican and political one—the voice, in fact, of the impious populace—made the cathedral the quintessential French romantic setting.

From The New Yorker • Apr. 16, 2019

Franca Sozzani, under whose 28-year direction Italian Vogue reigned as a daring and often impious iconoclast on the newsstand, died on Thursday in Milan.

From New York Times • Dec. 22, 2016

But—for this impious reader, at least—it’s also a temptation worth resisting.

From Slate • Mar. 17, 2016

At a respectably subordinate distance behind Joseph came the women of Galilee, mixed in with a motley, perhaps gate-crashing crowd of mourners, spectators, children, and no less than three frisky, impious mongrels.

From "Nine Stories" by J. D. Salinger