Hello everyone, it’s been a week since I posted about having to go to confession due to masturbating. I have since gone to confession and have not masturbated for a week. However, I still tend to touch myself at times especially when I am bored, but I have not ejaculated. Is it still mortal sin to touch yourself but not ejaculate?
I think this would come down to intentions: For example, you might ask yourself: “Did I intend to extract pleasure?” Or was it something totally out of your control (e.g., perhaps it was done while sleeping).
It is not just about intentions. The nature of act is also a key attribute of sin. The Church calls masturbation, with or without ejaculation, an intrinsically and gravely disordered action.
[quote=CCC]2352 By masturbation is to be understood the deliberate stimulation of the genital organs in order to derive sexual pleasure. “Both the Magisterium of the Church, in the course of a constant tradition, and the moral sense of the faithful have been in no doubt and have firmly maintained that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action.” “The deliberate use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose.” For here sexual pleasure is sought outside of “the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love is achieved.”
To form an equitable judgment about the subjects’ moral responsibility and to guide pastoral action, one must take into account the affective immaturity, force of acquired habit, conditions of anxiety or other psychological or social factors that lessen, if not even reduce to a minimum, moral culpability.
[/quote]
Yes, the catechism.says; "Deliberate stimulisation of the genital organs for sexual pleasure is ALWAYS a GRAVE SIN’. So touching yourself there for pleasure:
If done deliberately, freely, and with full knowledge is a mortal sin. Meaning you cannot receive communion until confessed, and run the risk of missing Heaven if you die without repenting/ confessing
Jesus told St John Bosco through one of his visions that ALL impure sins, were mortal sins -With regard to purity there are no venial sins if full knowledge, freedom, and deliberately done.
Impurity means dont touch your private area ever
Unless you have a case of the fleas or chickenpox
God is with you.
Think: What would Jesus do?
It is not about Intentions, in the sense that “Intention” is understood to be what gave rise to the act (see ccc1752). For example, providing a sperm donation for a medical test may involve masturbation, and the Intention, in the just stated sense, which is good, does not make the act good. For even with this “Intention” the act is what it is.
But, to a degree, it is about intentions, for that - the extraction of sexual pleasure - is inherent in the definition of the act. Mere “touching” itself does not necessarily rise to the level of masturbation.
An “unaware” act cannot be gravely sinful.
I can’t tell if you are being sarcastic or serious?
According to the CCC, intention, is one of the three criteria for determining the morality of an act.
1750 The morality of human acts depends on:
- the object chosen;
- the end in view or the intention;
- the circumstances of the action.
The object, the intention, and the circumstances make up the “sources,” or constitutive elements, of the morality of human acts.
Highlighting is mine.
But, to a degree, it is about intentions, for that - the extraction of sexual pleasure - is inherent in the definition of the act. Mere “touching” itself does not necessarily rise to the level of masturbation.
An “unaware” act cannot be gravely sinful.
Yes, I know this. A bad Intention is sufficient, but not necessary, to make an act immoral.
Or your’re just washing it obviously.
sorry in advance for this crude example, but has anyone seen the movie “There’s Something About Mary” and the scene where Ben Stiller masturbates because he knows he shouldn’t go on a date “with a loaded gun?” of course, this is a sinful act, but what if we change the scenario a bit. some men suffer from premature ejaculation, and what if a husband who suffers from this masturbates so that when he has sex with his wife, he will last longer? is it sinful for a man to masturbate when his sole intention is to please his wife, and in fact it is the only way he can please his wife?
Yes, still sinful. Maturbation is considered intrinsically evil - so no good intention can justify it.
They can just have a second go at it.
Back to the OP’s question…
While this is a matter best discussed with one’s confessor, I have a few thoughts…
Any time someone who is struggling with masturbation stops before completing the act, they should be pleased to have fought off the temptation. Mark it in the win column, not the loss column.
Is it mortal sin? Let’s consider that mortal sin needs to have full consent. Or another way it is put is “sufficient reflection”. The fact that one stops himself (or herself) before completing the act shows, or at least strongly implies, that they did not fully consent. In fact, their reflecting on what they were doing caused them to stop. Without full consent, it is not mortal sin.
Disclaimer: these are abstract/theoretical comments and of course these matters should be discussed with one’s confessor.
fair enough 
Im just quoting the catechism that stimulation of the genital organs for pleasure is always a grave sin,
If the three conditions for mortal sin are present, then it is a mortal sin. And needs to be confessed.
You said “don’t touch your private area ever”. Which is very different to what you just said above.
By your earlier comment, I’d be commiting mortal sin every time I go to the toilet. :eek:
Every sexual act deprived of the marital meaning, or the procreative meaning, or the unitive meaning, is intrinsically evil and always gravely immoral. Masturbation is deprived of all three (even if the person committing the act is married).
Intention never justifies any intrinsically evil act.
Neither does a difficult circumstance justify an intrinsically evil act.
Climax, for the man or the woman, is not essential to the immorality of a sexual sin. So if a young unmarried couple unfortunately decide to have premarital sex, and one or the other or both do not reach climax, the act remains a gravely immoral sexual act. The same is true for other intrinsically evil sexual acts: homosexual acts, unnatural sexual acts, adultery, masturbation, etc.
The only moral sexual act is natural marital relations open to life.
In the context of a married couple, when does a look, a word, a posture or a touch become a sexual act? And when does that act acquire, if at all, it’s unitive and procreative meanings?