Question About Mortal Sin

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turtle18

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Time and time again on this forum, I see posters stating that things which are obviously mortal sins are venial sins. The reason for this is the general ignorance of the Catholic population as whole as to what is right and what is wrong. If you peruse these forums, you can see posters suggest that contraception, masturbation, stealing & even abortion can be venial, because someone didn’t know it was grave matter or someone didn’t have full knowledge that it was wrong.

My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
 
You don’t have to be a professional apologist to put God first.

We’re not expected to know everything there is to know about Church teaching because we are always learning and growing. Seeking out the knowledge of what is and isn’t mortal sin, the example you posted, is a great example of how many use CAF to learn about their Catholic faith and so in doing that, aren’t they putting God first?
 
turtle18 said:
So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
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There are two kinds of ignorance: vincible (ignorance for which one is responsible) and invincible (ignorance for which one is not responsible).

It is possible that an additional sin such as you describe could be committed by a person whose ignorance is vincible - easily corrected and culpable. However, a person who does not even know, through poor formation or whatever other circumstance known only to God, that he should find out the difference between right and wrong in certain circumstances, cannot be held responsible for not knowing what is sinful and what is not. Such a person may commit many objectively bad acts, but no serious sins because of this innocent ignorance.

That’s why it’s incumbent upon those with good formation to spread good doctrine among their friends and loved ones.

Betsy
 
Some of these things can surely be venial. Would a third grader who masturbates be committing mortal sin if he/she does not even understand anatomy yet? It is not his/her ‘responsibility’ at that point to investigate matters such as those. And what if he/she does not understand that it is wrong for many years later, once it has already become an addiction? This situation happens more than I’d like to admit. Originally, this is surely not a mortal sin! It only becomes one once the individual becomes aware of it as grave matter and is in the process of breaking the addiction.
 
rowermath said:
Some of these things can surely be venial. Would a third grader who masturbates be committing mortal sin if he/she does not even understand anatomy yet? It is not his/her ‘responsibility’ at that point to investigate matters such as those. And what if he/she does not understand that it is wrong for many years later, once it has already become an addiction? This situation happens more than I’d like to admit. Originally, this is surely not a mortal sin! It only becomes one once the individual becomes aware of it as grave matter and is in the process of breaking the addiction.
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So long as it remains an addictionespecially one admits and is really trying to break} it is not a mortal sin…
 
The CCC is pretty clear that there are countless factors that lessen guilt of that sin…this applies to all grave matter, but they explicitly put it under masturbation for a reason. It will always be objectivley wrong, however. This is important as prohibition of this is a foundation to Catholic sexual ethics. But the Church is very merciful in this area to people who have problems with this. Not people who freely do it without a care in the world, however.
 
turtle18 said:
My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts?
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You are obligated to form your conscience. Gross failure to do so can easily be a mortal sin. But people can find themselves at a point where their conscience is riddled with unsuspected errors even though they have not grossly neglected their formation. They have only been somewhat lazy here and there, often believed the wrong people, occasionally studied bad books in good faith, thinking the books were good, postponed following up on a lead and then got busy and forgot about it, etc. Each individual act was venial. A classic example would be me, trying to find out more about the faith as a new convert, so I took the Lenten class we had at our parish. It was on the enneagram, and given by our pastor. I had no clue that this was not the way to go. Yet there I was, diligently taking notes and forming my conscience and trying to become more spiritual, determined to use the time of lent to prepare well for Easter.

So, no, the action that flows from your erroneous judgment of conscience need not be a mortal sin. It might only be venial, depending on how you got to that state of affairs. In some cases it might even be blameless.

If at any point you suspect your conscience has been formed in error, please, please go and try to fix the situation. Also, get some help from a knowledgeable person to guide you so that you use the right, orthodox resources. Furthermore, even if you think you have mostly learned your stuff, I think it is good to spend a little time every now and then refreshing your memory with suitable material for that task. If the principle voice you hear every day is secular and worldy, it is easy to slowly find yourself unsconciously nodding in agreement to some subtle falsehood. Add better voices to your life.
 
turtle18 said:
Time and time again on this forum, I see posters stating that things which are obviously mortal sins are venial sins. The reason for this is the general ignorance of the Catholic population as whole as to what is right and what is wrong. If you peruse these forums, you can see posters suggest that contraception, masturbation, stealing & even abortion can be venial, because someone didn’t know it was grave matter or someone didn’t have full knowledge that it was wrong.

My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
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Good argument. It is an obligation of all Catholics to educate themselves on such teachings. And when it becomes too difficult for one to judge for oneself, then a good spititual director, or good priest should be sought out to assist in one’s search for understanding.
 
turtle18 said:
Time and time again on this forum, I see posters stating that things which are obviously mortal sins are venial sins. The reason for this is the general ignorance of the Catholic population as whole as to what is right and what is wrong. If you peruse these forums, you can see posters suggest that contraception, masturbation, stealing & even abortion can be venial, because someone didn’t know it was grave matter or someone didn’t have full knowledge that it was wrong.

My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
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Oh the irony 😃

Please read the Catechism on mortal and venial sins. You will learn much, grasshopper 😉
 
turtle18 said:
Time and time again on this forum, I see posters stating that things which are obviously mortal sins are venial sins. The reason for this is the general ignorance of the Catholic population as whole as to what is right and what is wrong. If you peruse these forums, you can see posters suggest that contraception, masturbation, stealing & even abortion can be venial, because someone didn’t know it was grave matter or someone didn’t have full knowledge that it was wrong.

My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
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I’m curious as to why you even care. Your profile shows you have no religion.
 
thistle said:
Why? The OP is making disparaging remarks about Catholics and I simply want to know why when he does not state any religion at all.
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I’m sorry…I don’t mean to intrude, but I thought he/she had made a very good point in saying we as Catholics are supposed to inform our conscience with the truths of our faith and the beliefs we all share and hold to be true. Your remark in response did appear a bit unkind to me.:o
 
Is it still true that mortal sin means the relationship between a man, or woman, and God is broken? Doesn’t our Church teach that the preferred way to fix the break is the Sacrament of Confession?
 
ready said:
I’m sorry…I don’t mean to intrude, but I thought he/she had made a very good point in saying we as Catholics are supposed to inform our conscience with the truths of our faith and the beliefs we all share and hold to be true. Your remark in response did appear a bit unkind to me.:o
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Well I disagree with you. I am entitled to my own opinion or is that forbidden??
 
Mortal sin, from what I understand has to meet certain criteria.

It has to be of grave matter.
It has to be committed with the consent of the individual.
The individual must know that the sin is mortal.

(I might have left something out of twisted it in the process)

Let’s take masturbation, for instance. I think this is the most common of the mortal sins committed. I won’t go into why this is a sin, as this has been covered in many other places.

To a youngster who is sexually and emotionally immature, it is not a mortal sin because the youngster doesn’t know that it is. He doesn’t understand the sexuality of the body nor does he undertsant the nature of the Holy Spirit and the place that it has in our salvation. He only knows that it feels good and so he keeps doing it.

A person may know that it is a mortal sin, yet out of habit or addiction may be unable to stop. The compulsion is stronger than he is. There is a lesser degree of culpability here – provided that the individual makes honest and concerted attempts (through the sacrament of reconciliation and prayer) to stop this practice. If the individual knows that his culpability is lessened due to his addiction – and uses this as a rationale to contiune the practice – then yes, he is culpable and the sin is a mortal one.

A few words on Confession.

We go to confession for the forgiveness of sins. Yet we continue to sin. This is our nature. But it does not give us license to sin freely because we know that we can be forgiven in the convessional the following week.

Seriously – we bathe regularly, not because we want to get dirty as soon as possible, but because we want to remain clean.

Take care and God bless
Walter
 
larry85704 said:
Is it still true that mortal sin means the relationship between a man, or woman, and God is broken? Doesn’t our Church teach that the preferred way to fix the break is the Sacrament of Confession?
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Larry,

I can’t tell if your question is rhetorical, or if you are looking for an answer. So, here is an answer. 🙂 It is yes and yes, respectively. Even if one makes an act of perfect contrition outside of confession that restores the right relationship (friendship with God), that act still contains an implicit desire to go to confession, at the first opportunity.

Here is a Catechism quote:
**1452 **When it arises from a love by which God is loved above all else, contrition is called “perfect” (contrition of charity). Such contrition remits venial sins; it also obtains forgiveness of mortal sins if it includes the firm resolution to have recourse to sacramental confession as soon as possible.
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turtle18 said:
Time and time again on this forum, I see posters stating that things which are obviously mortal sins are venial sins. The reason for this is the general ignorance of the Catholic population as whole as to what is right and what is wrong. If you peruse these forums, you can see posters suggest that contraception, masturbation, stealing & even abortion can be venial, because someone didn’t know it was grave matter or someone didn’t have full knowledge that it was wrong.

My question is this, if you truly love God and put Him first in your life, aren’t you obligated to find out what the Church teaches on these subjects, what the difference is between right and wrong, etc?

So even if your abortion, contraception use, etc. is a venial sin, haven’t you really committed a mortal sin by not putting God first and thereby not knowing his precepts? The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind.
Click to expand...
(Acts 5:1-11) The Fraud of Ananias and Sapphira: Peter said they were lying to the Holy Spirit so I would say they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and knew God. This Scripture illustrates what happens when a person who knows God willfully and deliberately commit a sin. Of course it isn’t always a physical death, but it is death. God showed us way back I (Exodus 32:28)”The sons of Levi carried out the command of Moses, and of the people about three thousand men perished that day.”
(Acts 5:1-11) “There was another man, however, called Ananias. He and his wife, Sapphira, agreed to sell a property; but with his wife’s connivance he kept back part of the proceeds, and brought the rest and presented it to the apostles. Ananias, Peter said ‘now can Satan have so possessed you that you should lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the money from the land? While you still owned the land, wasn’t it yours to keep, and after you had sold it wasn’t the money yours to do with as you liked? What put this scheme into your mind? It is not to men that you have lied, but to God. When he heard this Ananias fell down dead. This made a profound impression on everyone present. The younger men got up, wrapped the body in a sheet, carried it out and buried it.

About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had taken place. Peter challenged her, ‘Tell me was this the price you sold the land for? ‘Yes,’ she said ‘that was the price.’ Peter then said, ‘So you and your husband have agreed to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test! What made you do it? You hear those footsteps? They have just been to bury your husband; they will carry you out, too.’ Instantly she dropped dead at his feet. When the young men came in they found she was dead, and they carried her out and buried her by the side of her husband. This made a profound impression on the whole Church and on all who heard it.
 
Hello Pug

Thanks for the information. I am glad to know I didn’t have it completely wrong. You know, I can’t remember when I learned that a mortal sin broke the relationship with God.

So then, suppose I have this relationship with God. I am faithful to my wife, I go to church every Sunday, and pray with my family. That is to say my life has the outward appearance of a relationship with God. Now suppose I commit a grave sin, like missing church on Sunday. Doesn’t matter why. Next Sunday I go back to church, and go to Communion. My relationship with God was not broken because I missed church on Sunday. So then I’d have to say that even though I committed a serious sin, I did not commit a mortal sin. Any thoughts on that?
 
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