Confessing something I don't think is a sin

[Deo_Gratias42]

What if she has a fully informed conscience and still did not regard it as a mortal sin. Primacy of conscience

It’s still a sin, and a grave one at that. It’s one of the precepts of the Church! We can’t just go around deciding these things.

 

[Country_Gal]

My feeling is, the Church browbeats us on Mass attendance because, ultimately attending builds us up spiritually, and a lot of folks would otherwise be slackers. I think they are overstating the gravity of non-attendance as a means to a positive end. Protestant churches do this with peer and social pressures.

That said, I do respect the Church rules about communion.

 

[LilyM]

My feeling is, the Church browbeats us on Mass attendance because, ultimately attending builds us up spiritually, and a lot of folks would otherwise be slackers. I think they are overstating the gravity of non-attendance as a means to a positive end. Protestant churches do this with peer and social pressures.

That said, I do respect the Church rules about communion.

No. Jesus is Truth incarnate, and the Church which is His mouthpiece also teaches only what is true. Neither He nor it would ‘overstate’ (which is a nice way of saying ‘lie about’) such things as the gravity of a particular act - not even to achieve some other good - because that would be an offense against that truth

HE, not just the Church,‘browbeats’ us about Mass attendance because it is important to Him as well as beneficial to us that we go, and for no other reason.

Put it this way - why bother respect the Church rule about communion but not the one about Mass attendance? If the last is an instance of overstating that is not a ‘real’ rule, then surely the first is as well? Such cherrypicking is the height of illogicality.

 

[InLight247]

I haven’t been to mass in several years, until recently. I’d like to return to communion, but confessing that I’ve missed mass would be hypocritical, since I don’t think it’s a serious sin. But I can’t have communion if I don’t.

Attending Mass on Sunday is in God’s Ten Commandments – the first and the third Commandments.

The first Commandment - I am the Lord thy God: Thou shall not have strange Gods before me. Not attending Mass to worship God but doing all other things on Sunday is putting other things before God.

The third Commandment - Keep the Sabbath Holy. This one directly says we must go to church on Sundays and holy days of obligation.

The Church and the Bible both say it is a serious sin of missing Sunday Mass.

 

[bben15]

You have an obligation to attend Mass every Saturday evening or Sunday under pain of mortal sin. You can only miss Mass for a serious reason.

Also, you have an obligation to go to confession at least once a year under pain of mortal sin. If you haven’t been to confession in more than a year, you would need to confess that too.

Not to pile on here, but I’m assuming you haven’t received the Eucharist in years. Every Catholic has an obligation to receive the Eucharist at least once a year under pain of mortal sin. So, you would need to confess that too.

God bless you for returning to Christ.

 

[Pug]

My feeling is, the Church browbeats us on Mass attendance because, ultimately attending builds us up spiritually, and a lot of folks would otherwise be slackers. I think they are overstating the gravity of non-attendance as a means to a positive end. Protestant churches do this with peer and social pressures.

That said, I do respect the Church rules about communion.

The authorities we typically encounter operate as you describe, by doing things like benevolently overstating their case. The Church does not operate like this. The doctrine is spoken as is, without double-speak. Unlike with many parents and earthly authorities, we are not responsible to do both what they actually say and what they secretly mean or want. Doctrine is what they truly mean, with no secret meanings or motivations.

I hate to use a fancy word, but I can’t think of something better right now. It is like a new paradigm once one realizes that the Church is being straight with us.

 

[Country_Gal]

You have an obligation to attend Mass every Saturday evening or Sunday under pain of mortal sin. You can only miss Mass for a serious reason.

Also, you have an obligation to go to confession at least once a year under pain of mortal sin. If you haven’t been to confession in more than a year, you would need to confess that too.

Not to pile on here, but I’m assuming you haven’t received the Eucharist in years. Every Catholic has an obligation to receive the Eucharist at least once a year under pain of mortal sin. So, you would need to confess that too.

God bless you for returning to Christ.

Many Catholics never go to confession. I used to go once a month or so, in the hour allotted, and very few people went, and the ones there didn’t look like heavy sinners… There weren’t even a whole lot during Lent.

 

[bben15]

Many Catholics never go to confession. I used to go once a month or so, in the hour allotted, and very few people went, and the ones there didn’t look like heavy sinners… There weren’t even a whole lot during Lent.

They still have an obligation to go, whether they choose to or not. Note that you are only required to go to confession at least once a year if you are in a state of mortal sin. I doubt though that most people aren’t going to confession because they haven’t mortally sinned. I wish it was the reason, though.

 

[TheWarriorMonk]

I haven’t been to mass in several years, until recently. I’d like to return to communion, but confessing that I’ve missed mass would be hypocritical, since I don’t think it’s a serious sin. But I can’t have communion if I don’t.

A lot of people are simply missing what you are saying here. They’re telling you what is a sin, completely bypassing the question.

Fact is, we are not perfect beings. Many Catholics don’t believe that certain things are a sin. And it isn’t like they are taking up signs to protest this either; it’s just that deep down inside they feel something is not quite right.

To keep it brief, simply confess that you’ve missed Mass, and also discuss that you don’t think it is a sin. Listen to your confessor’s advice. And then don’t miss Mass in the future. The first step in understanding is not perfection; it’s assent. If that’s the best you can do, then it is the best you can do. In fact, assenting to a teaching while you may disagree with it is a sign of humbleness and great respect.

 

[JRKH]

A lot of people are simply missing what you are saying here. They’re telling you what is a sin, completely bypassing the question.

Fact is, we are not perfect beings. Many Catholics don’t believe that certain things are a sin. And it isn’t like they are taking up signs to protest this either; it’s just that deep down inside they feel something is not quite right.

To keep it brief, simply confess that you’ve missed Mass, and also discuss that you don’t think it is a sin. Listen to your confessor’s advice. And then don’t miss Mass in the future. The first step in understanding is not perfection; it’s assent. If that’s the best you can do, then it is the best you can do. In fact, assenting to a teaching while you may disagree with it is a sign of humbleness and great respect.

 

[Country_Gal]

A lot of people are simply missing what you are saying here. They’re telling you what is a sin, completely bypassing the question.

Fact is, we are not perfect beings. Many Catholics don’t believe that certain things are a sin. And it isn’t like they are taking up signs to protest this either; it’s just that deep down inside they feel something is not quite right.

To keep it brief, simply confess that you’ve missed Mass, and also discuss that you don’t think it is a sin. Listen to your confessor’s advice. And then don’t miss Mass in the future. The first step in understanding is not perfection; it’s assent. If that’s the best you can do, then it is the best you can do. In fact, assenting to a teaching while you may disagree with it is a sign of humbleness and great respect.

True. I’ll do that soon. Not quite there yet.

 

[Sheeniac]

My feeling is, the Church browbeats us on Mass attendance because, ultimately attending builds us up spiritually, and a lot of folks would otherwise be slackers. I think they are overstating the gravity of non-attendance as a means to a positive end. Protestant churches do this with peer and social pressures.
.

And perhaps the Church IS doing this because we’d otherwise be slackers… I suggest that doesn’t matter either way.

“I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” NAB, Mt 16:19

The Church’s rule is binding us on earth, as Jesus promised to Peter. Obedience is of utmost importance in both Old and New Testament, as well as in the ‘early’ Church. I would suggest that your opinion of what is sin (in this case) is an opinion you should strive to disregard. It is a VERY difficult thing to trust the Church’s opinion over your own. But it is a worthwhile goal. We are inclined to sin, and to love to overlook/gloss over our sinful inclinations. This is especially so in our modern age with our emphasis on doing our own thing and what feels right to us.

From another perspective, they removed the required abstinence from meat on Fridays since people should be able to choose another penance. Well, guess what happened. No abstinence, no penance, no notion of any such idea. So sad,

The Church has said that missing Mass is a mortal sin, which separates one from God. If you cannot spend ‘just an hour’ with God (as his Apostles couldn’t in Gethsemane) and don’t think it’s a big deal, I would question whether the 1st Commandment wasn’t being crossed.

I hope I’m not sounding too harsh. I was an atheist for 25 years, and when I came home to God and Church, I realized that if there was a disagreement on Dogma/Doctrine, I was probably wrong and my 2000 year old Church was probably right. It’s not easy to think this way, but there’s a peace in my life now.

If this sounds like too much, then I would going to Confession, praying "I believe, help my unbelief!” (RSV-2CE, Mk 9:24) and leave it in God’s hands.

 

[Gorgias]

My understanding is that if you didn’t realize something was a sin when you committed the sin, then it doesn’t count against you.

Close, but not quite. In order for a grave sin to be considered mortal, it must meet certain conditions, one of which is ‘full knowledge.’ If you’re not aware of the sinfulness of an action, it cannot be considered a mortal sin, but it’s still certainly a venial sin. So, it certainly “counts against you”, but it might not be counted as a mortal sin.

(Hope I’m not repeating something anyone else said – I looked through this thread, and didn’t notice that this point had been addressed as such.)

Blessings,

G.

 

[Gordon_Sims]

Close, but not quite. In order for a grave sin to be considered mortal, it must meet certain conditions, one of which is ‘full knowledge.’ If you’re not aware of the sinfulness of an action, it cannot be considered a mortal sin, but it’s still certainly a venial sin. So, it certainly “counts against you”, but it might not be counted as a mortal sin.

(Hope I’m not repeating something anyone else said – I looked through this thread, and didn’t notice that this point had been addressed as such.)

Blessings,

G.

Thanks! That clears things up a bit for me and makes more sense.
Country Gal:

Many Catholics never go to confession. I used to go once a month or so, in the hour allotted, and very few people went, and the ones there didn’t look like heavy sinners… There weren’t even a whole lot during Lent.

What do heavy sinners look like? I went to Confession a while back and this guy was there with his 13-year-old daughter. She goes to our girls’ school and from my limited dealings with her, she seems like a very nice, sweet kid. Her dad was joking with her and us in the confessional line and we were all having a good time. The longer she was in the confessional, though, the more his mood soured. After fifteen minutes or so, the guy was a wreck. None of can say what she was confessing, or if she was just chatting with Father about the server schedule, but her dad’s imagination surely ran wile over just how heavy a sinner she may have been since her last Confession.

For the record, our parish’s Confession attendance used to be pretty dismal, even quite recently. We have it once a month and there was a stretch when I was the only person who showed up. It has increased quite a bit lately, and our priest is getting more and more calls for scheduled Confessions. I make a point of going at least once a month, even if all I’m confessing are venial sins. It helps to keep me on the straight and narrow.

 

[Country_Gal]

By not looking like heavy sinners I mean, the confessing folk were mainly of the geriatric, little old devout lady category. I don’t know what those old gals were up to, probably no more than backbiting and gossiping.

 

[Joan_M]

By not looking like heavy sinners I mean, the confessing folk were mainly of the geriatric, little old devout lady category. I don’t know what those old gals were up to, probably no more than backbiting and gossiping.

We should all go to confession regularly - at the very least, once per month, preferable more frequently - even if we “only” have venial sins to confess.

Imagine if only people with mortal sins to confess went to confession, then probably no one would go as everybody who saw them in the line would know they had committed mortal sin!

I am a “little devout lady”. I go to confession regularly. Why? To grow in grace; to get the help I need to overcome my predominant faults; to make sure I don’t back-slide into more serious sin. And, actually, backbiting and gossiping CAN be mortal sins. It depends on what is said and how malicious it is…

There is none of us without sin. We need to confess it frequently or we will get worse.

 

[Country_Gal]

We should all go to confession regularly - at the very least, once per month, preferable more frequently - even if we “only” have venial sins to confess.

Imagine if only people with mortal sins to confess went to confession, then probably no one would go as everybody who saw them in the line would know they had committed mortal sin!

I am a “little devout lady”. I go to confession regularly. Why? To grow in grace; to get the help I need to overcome my predominant faults; to make sure I don’t back-slide into more serious sin. And, actually, backbiting and gossiping CAN be mortal sins. It depends on what is said and how malicious it is…

There is none of us without sin. We need to confess it frequently or we will get worse.

I’m not criticizing, just saying that the the fornicating, drugging, embezzling or murdering gang bangers, from my observations, ain’t using the confessional.

As far as venial sinners going regularly, from the logistical and statistical point of view, if everyone went once a month like you say, what with the shortage of priests, it would be mathematically impossible for a priest to hear that many confessions. Add up the numbers of parishioners per parish, per priest. Divide it by four weeks in a month, say ten minutes per confession, and you would not have enough hours in the day.

 

[JRKH]

I’m not criticizing, just saying that the the fornicating, drugging, embezzling or murdering gang bangers, from my observations, ain’t using the confessional.

And herein lies the key…The vast majority of those in mortal sin have no desire to repent and get right with God. Or…In some/many cases they somehow think that God will overlook their sinful lifestyles.
But this is just part and parcel to how we get into mortal sin in the first place…
If one knows that something is a sin - and freely chooses to do it anyway - they are rejecting God’s Lordship over them…and…bingo…Mortal sin…or at least very serious sin…

As far as venial sinners going regularly, from the logistical and statistical point of view, if everyone went once a month like you say, what with the shortage of priests, it would be mathematically impossible for a priest to hear that many confessions. Add up the numbers of parishioners per parish, per priest. Divide it by four weeks in a month, say ten minutes per confession, and you would not have enough hours in the day.

Agreed that there can be practical limitations on these things.
However - if more people were to choose to go to confession regularly, the priests and the diocese would find a way to handle the increased flow. One possibility is using priests who aren’t assigned to parishes…Another is to use religious priests to augment the diocesan parish priests. Both of these things are already done regularly in regards to Sunday masses - it could easily be expanded to include confessions.

In addition - over time - an increase in the use of confession, and the accompanying increase in devout practicing Catholics, would very likely lead to an increase in men answering the call to priesthood. which would further alleviate any problem getting to confession.

Just some thoughts.

Peace
James

 

[LilyM]

I’m not criticizing, just saying that the the fornicating, drugging, embezzling or murdering gang bangers, from my observations, ain’t using the confessional.

As far as venial sinners going regularly, from the logistical and statistical point of view, if everyone went once a month like you say, what with the shortage of priests, it would be mathematically impossible for a priest to hear that many confessions. Add up the numbers of parishioners per parish, per priest. Divide it by four weeks in a month, say ten minutes per confession, and you would not have enough hours in the day.

Maybe. Very likely it’s regular use of the confessional that is what has stopped them from becoming fornicating, drugging, embezzling or murdering gang bangers in the first place, or else stopped them from returning to those sins if they did them in the past.

They weren’t always devout little old ladies y’know, and at least some of them probably regret having not taken advantage of the confessional oftener when they were younger with the same temptations to sin and actual sins that any of the rest of us have …

 

[terrig]

Someone told me, mass was made to give opportunities for the people who wants to know God and to find there way to heaven, that’s why i think its not a sin but an opportunity and its your decision whether to take that opportunity or ignore it

Someone must not have read their Bible if the belief is that Mass was made up. Jesus instituted the Mass at the Last Supper and said to do this in remembrance of me. Jesus also gave the apostles the power to loosen and binding, Thru the successors of the apostle, the Church decided to establish Sunday as a day of obligation to participate in the Mass. I didn’t used to think it was a mortal sin either and thought how can God send someone to hell for not attending Mass on Sunday just because of laziness and wanting to sleep in (my reason). Until I began to educate myself in the faith and learned the power of loosening and binding. Those were Jesus’s words not mine. He gave that power and until the Church says it’s not a mortal sin to miss Mass on Sunday, I got to get up. Really, what is one hour a week to give to God? He’s not asking for much.