I'm confused as to whether this was a mortal sin

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I’m going to try keep this as anonymous as possible, so feel free to ask if you need a better description.
  • My boyfriend (who is religious himself but not Christian) agrees that sexual activity shouldn’t occur outside of marriage.
  • He has less discipline in this area than I do and I often have to ask him to stop or snap at him when he starts getting touchy.
  • The other week, we were on our own and we hugged and kissed. I started to get ‘that’ feeling 😊 so said we should stop, but he said that it would be fine because he felt like he had lots of self-control that day…
  • I felt like I was sinning for continuing when it wasn’t just romantic kissing. I didn’t want to go further, but I knew I didn’t have the will power to stop if he decided to 😦
Was this a mortal sin? It happened a couple more times. He kept insisting that it wouldn’t be a sin because nothing sexual happened, but I think that it was because I knew we could have gone further.

I can’t decide if it was a mortal sin. I feel really guilty about it, especially because it’s Lent. Some people may say that it wasn’t a mortal sin because we didn’t engage in sexual activity, but the fact that I knew this could happen and didn’t stop us could make it mortal?
 
I don’t think that what you described is mortal sin but it is a fine description of where you need to draw the line. Mention it in confession next time and quit playing with fire. Sexual urges can overtake our rationalization process and lead us to areas that should be avoided. You know that already. God bless you… teachccd
 
m8g8 said:
I’m going to try keep this as anonymous as possible, so feel free to ask if you need a better description.
  • My boyfriend (who is religious himself but not Christian) agrees that sexual activity shouldn’t occur outside of marriage.
  • He has less discipline in this area than I do and I often have to ask him to stop or snap at him when he starts getting touchy.
  • The other week, we were on our own and we hugged and kissed. I started to get ‘that’ feeling 😊 so said we should stop, but he said that it would be fine because he felt like he had lots of self-control that day…
  • I felt like I was sinning for continuing when it wasn’t just romantic kissing. I didn’t want to go further, but I knew I didn’t have the will power to stop if he decided to 😦
Was this a mortal sin? It happened a couple more times. He kept insisting that it wouldn’t be a sin because nothing sexual happened, but I think that it was because I knew we could have gone further.

I can’t decide if it was a mortal sin. I feel really guilty about it, especially because it’s Lent. Some people may say that it wasn’t a mortal sin because we didn’t engage in sexual activity, but the fact that I knew this could happen and didn’t stop us could make it mortal?
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I too am on the fence about this.
Basically what you are saying is that your will power was overcome, and so if he had continued you would not have resisted…So what you did was turn your will over to another. It was in your boyfriends hands and in his will to do as he decided…To me this sounds very serious…
So we have at least two fot he three criteria met. You knew you should not be doing this and you were freely choosing to do it anyway. The only issue is whether what you were doing consituted grave matter…My personal opinion is yes it does, particularly in light of full knowledge and full freedom of the will.

Now remember that all of the above is simply the opinion of a layman…No one here can give you a definitive answer.

You need to take this to your confessor…

Peace
James
 
What you described was not a mortal sin, but an occasion of sin. There are differences. An occasion of sin is an instance where you may be led to sin by doing something you know you should not be doing. Your conscience was speaking to you–which is the voice of God in your heart. If I were you, I would have stopped what I was doing since you felt it was not right. It doesn’t matter if he “thinks he has self-control.” To err is human. You owe it to yourself to respect your conscience as it should be your guide. To ignore it is to ignore God. Here is more on the subject:

Occasions of Sin
 
Stop! Feeling so guilty about your sexuality. Sex is a good thing and I don’t think it needs to come with a mind boggling amount of restrictions, though one does need to understand the responsibility that comes with it.
 
Just a word of caution - if you continuously have to tell your boyfriend to stop (which you mention you frequently do) because you feel uncomfortable about how fast you’re moving and especially if he doesn’t listen to you about wanting to stop (which it sounds like he doesn’t and is trying to convince you to keep going), I would highly question how much respect he has for you. No, your sexuality is not a bad thing, but it doesn’t sound like he truly values your wishes. To me (even as a guy) that raises huge red flags.

Now I do need to stress the fact that I obviously don’t know your situation or anything about you guys other than the very little information you stated in this thread - this is just some friendly advice that you may or may not agree with. I’m not saying he’s a bad guy or anything (again, don’t know him), but you may want to reflect on the description of your relationship you’ve shared with us and the history of your experiences with him.
 
I can completely relate to this.
Its not a mortal sin but anything that you KNOW can lead you to sin you should avoid—especially if you don’t think you have the self control. It is too much of a tempation. It’s like placing a liqour bottle in front of an alcoholic. He’s putting himself in risk of drinking that bottle when he know he lacks self control. He may not drink it this time, but next time it may not be so easy.
 
alongexpected said:
Stop! Feeling so guilty about your sexuality. Sex is a good thing and I don’t think it needs to come with a mind boggling amount of restrictions, though one does need to understand the responsibility that comes with it.
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While I understand that you believe this, it is not an appropriate response on this particular thread. I note from other postings that you are an atheist. Given that fact I don’t believe that what you “think” about the matter is of any great value in a discussion between believers.
Now if you have something to offer that would fall within the boundaries of the teachings of the church relatine either to what constitutes mortal sin, or sexual sin, that would be quite different and most welcome. Otherwise, simply posting your opinion, from a non-Catholic, non-Thiest viewpoint, only serves to confuse.

Peace
James
 
JRKH said:
While I understand that you believe this, it is not an appropriate response on this particular thread. I note from other postings that you are an atheist. Given that fact I don’t believe that what you “think” about the matter is of any great value in a discussion between believers.
Now if you have something to offer that would fall within the boundaries of the teachings of the church relatine either to what constitutes mortal sin, or sexual sin, that would be quite different and most welcome. Otherwise, simply posting your opinion, from a non-Catholic, non-Thiest viewpoint, only serves to confuse.

Peace
James
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I have to second the above statement. It is a very disrespectful and a dangerous thing to tell someone to abandon their belief system in general - but especially in a situation where they just stated they were uncomfortable with what was going on.

You don’t need to agree or disagree with someone’s beliefs but you should try to answer them from where they are not where you are … (when talking to someone you don’t even know - this is not like your best friend or your little sister)

that being said while sexuality is a wonderful thing the boundaries we set for ourselves whatever the basis should absolutely be respected by anyone we are dating. period.

I would suggest you talk to your boyfriend about this BEFORE it happens-
Don’t wait til you have to tell him to stop again. Go out to lunch and talk in a situation where nothing can happen and you can just talk about it.
A very important part of having healthy relationships is communication and learning how to make sure you are on the same page w things. He should know how you feel about this.
I really urge you to talk to him when you are not in the moment. This is good practice in general for a lot of aspects of dating … its much harder to deal with something while it’s happening.
Then when you feel him going to far just pull back and say we talked about this we need to stop.
If he doesn’t respect that re evaluate the relationship because no one should be pushing you …
 
m8g8: your playing with fire.If you continue you’ll surely get burnt.Your not allowed to put your self in an occasion of sin.
 
If your boyfriend does not respect your wishes to stop, it would be best to scale back the relationship to a friendship.
 
alongexpected said:
Stop! Feeling so guilty about your sexuality. Sex is a good thing and I don’t think it needs to come with a mind boggling amount of restrictions, though one does need to understand the responsibility that comes with it.
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Within the context of marriage it is a great thing. Outside of marriage there are spiritual and physical consequences. The OP does well in her discipline and her boundaries. If he really loves her he can wait. Nothing will fall off… teachccd
 
prstoessel said:
If your boyfriend does not respect your wishes to stop, it would be best to scale back the relationship to a friendship.
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That’s exactly what I was thinking.

He’s not listening to you when you say “stop”. He’s counting on you enjoying what’s happening more than respecting your desire to remain pure. That’s a very big problem, imo.

As far as whether or not it’s mortal…that’s kind of a tough call. Allowing yourself to be placed in such a near occasion of sin is not a good thing at all. Maybe you should talk to your Priest.

…and being a male, I can assure you that it’s not such a good thing to depend on his assurances of "self-control’ when he has a warm and somewhat-willing female in his arms. Especially when he disregards your desire to stop, even if your desire to stop is pretty weak. Such self-control can only last for so long before it rapidly vanishes.
 
My boyfriend (who is religious himself but not Christian) …
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Have you fully considered your Christian marriage relationship & the future raising of Christian children with this man?
 
COLOS said:
…and being a male, I can assure you that it’s not such a good thing to depend on his assurances of "self-control’ when he has a warm and somewhat-willing female in his arms. Especially when he disregards your desire to stop, even if your desire to stop is pretty weak. Such self-control can only last for so long before it rapidly vanishes.
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Just add to the problem, if he lost his self-control, and you already told him to stop, it turns into rape. Seriously, if this guy can’t respect your wishes, I would get him out of your life. Not even a friendship is a good idea. That is not a healthy or safe relationship.

I would bring this up in confession.
 
It was not a mortal sin because you said that you did not know for sure if it was a mortal sin.

For a sin to be mortal you must know that it is a mortal sin. It must be grave matter. It must be done with full consent of your will.
 
m8g8 said:
I’m going to try keep this as anonymous as possible, so feel free to ask if you need a better description.
  • My boyfriend (who is religious himself but not Christian) agrees that sexual activity shouldn’t occur outside of marriage.
  • He has less discipline in this area than I do and I often have to ask him to stop or snap at him when he starts getting touchy.
  • The other week, we were on our own and we hugged and kissed. I started to get ‘that’ feeling 😊 so said we should stop, but he said that it would be fine because he felt like he had lots of self-control that day…
  • I felt like I was sinning for continuing when it wasn’t just romantic kissing. I didn’t want to go further, but I knew I didn’t have the will power to stop if he decided to 😦
Was this a mortal sin? It happened a couple more times. He kept insisting that it wouldn’t be a sin because nothing sexual happened, but I think that it was because I knew we could have gone further.

I can’t decide if it was a mortal sin. I feel really guilty about it, especially because it’s Lent. Some people may say that it wasn’t a mortal sin because we didn’t engage in sexual activity, but the fact that I knew this could happen and didn’t stop us could make it mortal?
Click to expand...
Objectively speaking, anything done with lust is a mortal sin. But as previously stated, if you honestly didnt’ know then you are not culpable…but…NOW YOU KNOW! 👍 Confess it, as it was probably at least a venial sin because you knew it wasn’t right.

I have never heard of putting yourself in the occasion of sin being a mortal sin, only a venial sin. If all you did was french kiss then that in itself is not sinful. If you did more, then yeah. It would only be mortal if you actually fondled each other or did anything of a sexual nature. Remember, lust is a mortal sin if it is manifested. You have to be the judge of whether you allowed yourself to lust…and it has to be more than just the initial thought, which if you then put it out of your mind would not be sinful at all.

I have found that it is virtually impossible to kiss heavily and NOT have anything more happen. That is not how we were designed. Once we are attracted then naturally we get more attracted if we kiss. We weren’t designed to have kissing not affect us more. I have resigned to the fact that if I find someone with whom I can see being my wife then all we could do would be to kiss softly and on the lips and not let any make out session happen ever. Maybe in a semi public place I would kiss more for a short period because we would not be private and threrefore be less likely to go further. It seems harsh but I don’t see how anyone can make out and not have the problem you are facing. It almost always leads to either sin or frustration for one or both parties involved.

Never leave it to the guy. Our sexual organs are on the outside versus a woman’s being on the inside so if anyone has to be the leader in this then it must be you. We just can’t control ourselves if we let it get to that point. So do not make out with him ever.

I would check out Jason Everett’s site on this issue. I am sure he has material to get you on the right path.
 
alongexpected said:
Stop! Feeling so guilty about your sexuality. Sex is a good thing and I don’t think it needs to come with a mind boggling amount of restrictions, though one does need to understand the responsibility that comes with it.
Click to expand...
Respectfully, do not follow the above advice…

God is giving you the grace of prudence which you are exercising. Sex is a good thing ONLY in marriage and he tells us to be chaste, both in marriage and as a single person. Continue to think about your actions and how they affect your soul and the love you have…or should have…of God. It is obvious you love Him from the fact that you posted this question. But loving Him enough to avoid getting too physical with your dates is a true love that He wants. He will reward you for your commitment to Him. 🙂

Oh, and don’t forget that there is another soul you are partly responsible for in this scenario…your boyfriend’s. If you lose control and sin then you help cause your boyfriend to sin. Causing others to sin is most evil. So this is another reason to stop making out.
 
onmyknees said:
It was not a mortal sin because you said that you did not know for sure if it was a mortal sin.

For a sin to be mortal you must know that it is a mortal sin. It must be grave matter. It must be done with full consent of your will.
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There’s a fine line here. By in large, with experience people do “know” when their thoughts and actions are approaching near occasions for greater sin.

Which, people then either acknowledge with humility or reject with selfish pride.

It appears that this young lady is far more aware than her boyfriend.
 
I hope we hear back from the OP soon… Telling us that she has been to confession and discussed this with her confessor.

Peace
James
 
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