=coolcatholicguy;6486824]I am a Catholic teenager who has somewhat of an addiction to masturbating and fantisizing (not about actual sex, some about things that sexually turn me on). When I was younger I didn’t know it was wrong, but now I’ve heard teachings, and feel a little guilty.
Is it ok if I do it gradually less and less and eventually stop?
READ ON then you decide
***What your doing has a high proability of being a Mortal sin. ***
From our Catechism:
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.
2396 Among the sins gravely contrary to chastity are masturbation, fornication, pornography, and homosexual practices.
If I stop do I still have to say it in confession?
**
NO! If you don’t do it it’s not a sin [unless you want to do it and for reasons beyond your control are “not permitted.” Desire to do can be the same as doing.
Is it really that bad of a sin?
***For an action to be a Mortal Sin [unrepented and unconfessed can send one to Hell!]; three conditions must exist.
- Serious matter [This Is]
- You MUST know an understand that what your going to do is a Mortal sin BEFORE you do it! [Now you do!]
- You desire to do it anyway.
Now you know.***
If I do have to confess it in Reconciliation, do I have to define it specifically or can I just say, “I gave in to temptation.”?
Excellent question:
**1456 **Confession to a priest is an essential part of the sacrament of Penance: “All mortal sins of which penitents after a diligent self-examination are conscious must be recounted by them in confession, even if they are most secret and have been committed against the last two precepts of the Decalogue; for these sins sometimes wound the soul more grievously and are more dangerous than those which are committed openly.”
When Christ’s faithful strive to confess all the sins that they can remember, they undoubtedly place all of them before the divine mercy for pardon. But those who fail to do so and knowingly withhold some, place nothing before the divine goodness for remission through the mediation of the priest, “for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal what it does not know.”
They are to be confessed as a sin of masterbation; and the numer of times. REMEMBER: even under a threat of DEATH, the priest cannot revel what you tell him in Confession!
Have a good day
Happy Easter,
Emmett Conlon
Emett, young friend; your “playing with fire here;” pray daily for God’s immediate help to STOP!
Love and prayers,
Pat
