Thanks for all your replies. I was just starting to feel better about it and realized that I hadn’t sinned mortally the other day but then this morning, I made a stupid comment that I thought was funny at the time, but even in the middle of saying it, I knew it was wrong. I guess I’m having trouble figuring out if something is mortal based on how much knowledge I have when I committed the sin. I guess I’ve been wondering if I’m held to a higher standard on the knowledge and consent parts of mortal sin. I understand the concept of gravity for mortal sins too, but I guess when I was concerned about saying I hated someone, I was afraid that was breaking the Commandment of Thou Shall Not Kill.
So as a follow-up question, if one breaks one of the 10 Commandments, is that a grave matter?
My dear friend
Perhaps the following will help-
SIN. “A word, deed or desire in opposition to the eternal law” (St. Augustine). Sin is a deliberate transgression of a law of God, which identifies the four essentials of every sin. A law is involved, implying that there are physical laws that operate with necessity, and moral laws that can be disregarded by human beings. God is offended, so that the divine dimension is never absent from any sin. Sin is a transgression, since Catholicism holds that grace is resistible and the divine will can be disobeyed. And the transgression is deliberate, which means that a sin is committed whenever a person knows that something is contrary to the law of God and then freely does the action anyway. (Etym. Old English
synn,
syn, sin; Old High German
sunta,
suntea, perhaps to Latin
sons, guilty.)
MORTAL SIN. An actual sin that destroys sanctifying grace and causes the supernatural death of the soul. Mortal sin is a turning away from God because of a seriously inordinate adherence to creatures that causes grave injury to a person’s rational nature and to the social order, and deprives the sinner of a right to heaven.
The terms mortal, deadly, grave, and serious applied to sin are synonyms, each with a slightly different implication.
Mortal and
deadly focus on the effects in the sinner, namely deprivation of the state of friendship with God;
grave and
serious refer to the importance of the matter in which a person offends God. But the Church never distinguishes among these terms as though they represented different kinds of sins. There is only one recognized correlative to mortal sin, and that is venial sin, which offends against God but does not cause the loss of one’s state of grace. (Etym. Latin
mors, death.)
**VENIAL SIN. **An offense against God which does not deprive the sinner of sanctifying grace. It is called venial (from
venia, pardon) because the soul still has the vital principle that allows a cure from within, similar to the healing of a sick or diseased body whose source of animation (the soul) is still present to restore the ailing bodily function to health.
Deliberate venial sin is a disease that slackens the spiritual powers, lowers one’s resistance to evil, and causes one to deviate from the path that leads to heavenly glory. Variously called “daily sins” or “light sins” or “lesser sins,” they are committed under a variety of conditions: when a person transgresses with full or partial knowledge and consent to a divine law that does not oblige seriously; when one violates a law that obliges gravely but either one’s knowledge or consent is not complete; or when one disobeys what is an objectively grave precept but due to invincible ignorance a person thinks the obligation is not serious.
The essence of venial sin consists in a certain disorder but does not imply complete aversion from humanity’s final destiny. It is an illness of the soul rather than its supernatural death. When people commit a venial sin, they do not decisively set themselves on turning away from God, but from overfondness for some created good fall short of God. They are like persons who loiter without leaving the way.
A good examination of conscience
catholic-pages.com/penance/examine.asp
It is also a good practise to examine yourself to see what good you’ve done. This way we don’t over emphasise on the negatives in our spiritual life. It’s just a useful toll to help overcome sin with good works. Charity covers a multitude of sins.
I hope this helps.
God bless yoy and pray for me please:thumbsup:
John
