D
DL82
Guest
OK, the only way I can explain this is to give the actual situation.
I was looking at what I could watch on TV, and happened to notice that I was feeling an element of sexual tension. Nothing I consented to, but it was there, and I didn’t run away. That’s putting myself in a near occasion of sin, which in itself is at least a sin of omission.
I noted that there was one show I wouldn’t watch because I was worried I would have lustful thoughts about a particular actress.
Then a little later, I remember thinking to myself ‘she’s a very attractive woman’ - from that point on I had, in a sense, consented to take pleasure in her physical attractiveness - again, I didn’t run away, but my mind wandered to a show I had seen her in before, nothing sexual, nothing inappropriate per se, just a scene from a show, which had her in it, and I noted that she looks attractive.
Did I commit a mortal sin? There was awareness and consent. I don’t know whether simply smiling at the fact that I find someone attractive counts as covetousness. I wasn’t thinking of having sex with her, and deliberately avoided the show where I thought I might be pulled into those kinds of thoughts. Nonetheless, on some level, I have still consented to taking pleasure from the ‘sexual values’ of another person. I have heard it said that there are no venial sins against the 6th and 9th commandment, they are always grave matter. Is this a mortal sin?
In other words, do you have to imagine some kind of sexual contact with the other person before it’s the sin of lust, or is just taking pleasure in their fully-clothed physical attractiveness when they are not your wife a sin?
If this is all it takes to fall into mortal sin, I don’t know how I will ever begin dating or discerning a vocation to marriage (which I do believe I am/may be called to).
I was looking at what I could watch on TV, and happened to notice that I was feeling an element of sexual tension. Nothing I consented to, but it was there, and I didn’t run away. That’s putting myself in a near occasion of sin, which in itself is at least a sin of omission.
I noted that there was one show I wouldn’t watch because I was worried I would have lustful thoughts about a particular actress.
Then a little later, I remember thinking to myself ‘she’s a very attractive woman’ - from that point on I had, in a sense, consented to take pleasure in her physical attractiveness - again, I didn’t run away, but my mind wandered to a show I had seen her in before, nothing sexual, nothing inappropriate per se, just a scene from a show, which had her in it, and I noted that she looks attractive.
Did I commit a mortal sin? There was awareness and consent. I don’t know whether simply smiling at the fact that I find someone attractive counts as covetousness. I wasn’t thinking of having sex with her, and deliberately avoided the show where I thought I might be pulled into those kinds of thoughts. Nonetheless, on some level, I have still consented to taking pleasure from the ‘sexual values’ of another person. I have heard it said that there are no venial sins against the 6th and 9th commandment, they are always grave matter. Is this a mortal sin?
In other words, do you have to imagine some kind of sexual contact with the other person before it’s the sin of lust, or is just taking pleasure in their fully-clothed physical attractiveness when they are not your wife a sin?
If this is all it takes to fall into mortal sin, I don’t know how I will ever begin dating or discerning a vocation to marriage (which I do believe I am/may be called to).
