All words

profane

Meaning

Showing a lack of respect for something sacred or revered, or for accepted moral principles.

Examples by difficulty

Basic: Simple, everyday vocabulary — the easiest to read.

His crude jokes about the church felt so wrong. It was a deeply religious town, and his words, so utterly profane, caused gasps and angry murmurs. He clearly had no respect for their beliefs.

He knew the old temple was important to the villagers, a sacred place where their ancestors rested. Yet, he laughed and tossed a stone, his voice rough and profane as it echoed against the stone walls. It was a senseless act, spitting on everything they held dear.

When the ancient, polished glyphs of the forgotten star-charts were defaced with crude, scrawling symbols, the Elder felt a deep sickness. Such a thing was never meant to be touched, let alone marked. Their rage wasn't just anger; it was a chilling recognition of the profoundly profane act against the very fabric of their people's oldest beliefs.

Barnaby, a man whose manners were as wild as a badger in a teacup, found it hilarious to sing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" at the opera. The conductor's face went redder than a tomato. Barnaby's singing was so loud and silly, it seemed to show a lack of respect for the serious music.

Reginald's sock puppet, Bartholomew, declared war on the humble biscuit. Its tiny felt mouth spewed such profane insults at the tea-dunked delight, calling it a "stale interloper" and "crumbly peasant." The audacity! Even the teabag looked scandalized by the unprovoked pastry-shaming.

Normal: Standard, everyday language.

He slammed his fist on the table, the injustice of it all too much. His voice, usually so steady, turned harsh and low. He cursed the gods, his words laced with a fury that felt profane, a bitter rejection of everything he once held sacred.

The historian’s face contorted as he read the soldier’s diary. Scribbled in the margins were crude jokes and dismissive remarks about the fallen king, an act so utterly profane that it felt like a personal insult to the very stones of the cathedral they stood in.

The elders had always honored the Great Stone with hushed voices and offerings of dried moss. But today, as the surveyors arrived with their roaring machines, their shouts were loud and disrespectful, their actions utterly profane. They cared nothing for the history or the people who revered it.

My Uncle Barry, after stubbing his toe on a rogue garden gnome, let loose a string of profane exclamations that made the squirrels cover their tiny ears. He was definitely showing a lack of respect for his toes, and possibly the gnome's sacred duty to guard the petunias.

The esteemed cheese sculptor, Barnaby "Brie-jamin" Butterfield, was absolutely beside himself. His prize-winning cheddar gargoyle, a magnificent ode to fermented dairy, had been defaced with a vulgar scribbling. He sputtered, "Who would commit such a profane act against the King of Cheeses?!" His outrage stemmed from the utter lack of reverence for his cheesy masterpiece.

Advanced: Richer vocabulary that stretches an upper-level reader.

His outburst was utterly profane, a raw cry against the injustices he felt so deeply. To speak so carelessly of deeply held beliefs, in front of those who revered them, showed a shocking disregard for everything sacred.

The old shaman’s eyes narrowed as the tourist, oblivious, tossed a half-eaten sandwich onto the ancient burial mound. Such a profane act, so utterly disrespectful of the spirits and traditions that held this land sacred. He felt a deep unease, a violation of something profound.

The child's gleeful, almost manic, scribbling defaced the ancient, revered script. Her delighted giggles, a stark contrast to the hushed solemnity of the archive, felt utterly profane. It wasn't malicious, just a complete disregard for the centuries of careful preservation and the sacredness of the text, an act of innocent, yet devastating, desecration.

Grumbling about the burnt toast, Reginald declared it a *profane* insult to breakfast. He certainly showed a lack of respect for the sanctity of a perfectly browned slice, and his moral principles regarding morning sustenance were clearly compromised by the charred offering.

Barnaby's attempt to impress the esteemed Guild of Competitive Kazoo Virtuosos with his rendition of "Ode to Joy" quickly devolved. His instrument, apparently stuffed with last week's sardine sandwich, produced a sound so aggressively unharmonious, it bordered on the profane, offending even the pigeons roosting outside the hallowed hall.

Challenging: Rare, high-register vocabulary for serious word lovers.

He hurled a profane curse at the desecrated monument, his voice raw with indignation. To witness such a blatant disregard for the solemnity of the hallowed ground, for something so deeply revered by his community, was an outrage that stripped away all pretense of decorum, leaving only bitter, guttural anger.

The disgraced scholar, ostracized for his heretical treatises on chronophysics, felt a profound bitterness watching the temple guardians, their faces impassive, desecrate his life's work. Their deliberate, callous destruction of his painstakingly compiled data felt utterly profane, a violation of the very pursuit of knowledge he held sacred.

He stood in the hallowed chapel, his voice a guttural growl, spouting vulgarities that desecrated the solemn atmosphere. His blasphemous outburst, a complete repudiation of decorum, revealed a profound disrespect for the sanctity of the place and the tenets it represented.

The ancient, ossified relic, revered for generations as a conduit to the celestial spheres, was desecrated. His utterance, a guttural explosion of disbelief and vitriol, shattered the hushed solemnity of the chamber. Such a profane display before the sacred object was unthinkable, an affront to all deeply held convictions.

The monk's pronouncement, uttered with a sneer after witnessing the ritualistic immolation of the sentient biome, was utterly profane. His disregard for their millennia of tradition and the sacred pact he’d sworn to uphold felt like a laceration across the collective consciousness of the observers.

Difficulty

Normal — Everyday words worth reinforcing.

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