Mortal or Venial?

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Starbuck1

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Just getting my feet wet in the Catholic Church. Don’t understand the difference between mortal and venial sins. I know that mortal sins are more serious than venial. Is there any other way of defining exactly which is which?

Ken
 
Starbuck1 said:
Just getting my feet wet in the Catholic Church. Don’t understand the difference between mortal and venial sins. I know that mortal sins are more serious than venial. Is there any other way of defining exactly which is which?

Ken
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Three conditions are;

Mortal sin is a sin of grave matter
Mortal sin is committed with full knowledge of the sinner
Mortal sin is committed with deliberate consent of the sinner

Mortal sins destroy the grace of God in the heart of the sinner. By their very grave nature, a mortal sin cuts our relationship off from God and turns man away from his creator. St. Paul’s letter to the Hebrews tell us that “if we sin willfully after having the knowledge of the truth, there is now left no sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26). The second type of sin, venial sin, that of less grave matter, does not cut us off from Christ. However, venial sin does weaken grace in the soul and damages our relationship with God. A person who frequently indulges in venial sin is very likely to collapse into mortal sin if they persist in their evil ways.
 
THurifer2 said:
Three conditions are;

Mortal sin is a sin of grave matter
Mortal sin is committed with full knowledge of the sinner
Mortal sin is committed with deliberate consent of the sinner

Mortal sins destroy the grace of God in the heart of the sinner. By their very grave nature, a mortal sin cuts our relationship off from God and turns man away from his creator. St. Paul’s letter to the Hebrews tell us that “if we sin willfully after having the knowledge of the truth, there is now left no sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26). The second type of sin, venial sin, that of less grave matter, does not cut us off from Christ. However, venial sin does weaken grace in the soul and damages our relationship with God. A person who frequently indulges in venial sin is very likely to collapse into mortal sin if they persist in their evil ways.
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Thanks for the explanation. The typical Protestant response would be that all sin can cut us off from Christ. They may even say that hating someone would send them to Hell. After all, Jesus said that if you hate your neighbor it is the same as murder. If that is the case, then would hating someone, or even having a resentment against them, be considered a venial sin?

Ken
 
The Catechism of the Catholic Church is a great place to start for this. It has all the “whats” but not much of the “whys”. The Compendium to the Catechism has more of the “whys”. Both can be found at www.vatican.va, then click “resource library” then “Catechism of the Catholic Church”. That has both the Compendium and the Catechism.

Some discussion on the difference between mortal and venial sin can be found in Part Three, Acticle Eight.

This should give you a good background on what the Church teaches. If you want to know why they teach that, check out the footnotes, it shows you where it comes from, which I have found helpful.
 
Starbuck1 said:
The typical Protestant response would be that all sin can cut us off from Christ.
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“If anyone sees his brother sinning, if the sin is not deadly, he should pray to God and he will give him life. This is only for those whose sin is not deadly. There is such a thing as deadly sin, about which I do not say that you should pray. All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that is not deadly.” (1 John 5:16-17).

Deadly in this context does not mean “murderous”, it means deadly to the soul, ie. mortal.
 
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