Should this lie keep me from Communion?

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This seems silly to even type, but it is really bothering me (and yes, I do have isssues with scruples). I threw away something that belonged to my mother – it was old and gross. I planned on surprising her with a new one. However, I forgot to replace it. Yesterday she asked where it was and I lied and said I didn’t know. Later I went to confession and did not confess this; I simply did not realize this was a sin until after confession. I am truly sorry.
I plan on replacing the item and admitting to my mother that I lied to her since I have a history of committing sinful behavior to cover up other sinful behavior.
My question is whether this is mortal or venial, and whether I should avoid Holy Communion today and the rest of this week until confession next Saturday. Thank you for your help.
 
You said you did not realize it was a sin until after confession. That means you did not realize it was a sin when you did it. That means that you did not have the knowledge that is required to make a sin mortal.

I would also think that, unless the item was very valuable, you’re not dealing with grave matter here, either.

So you seem to be missing at least one, and probably two of the necessary conditions to make a mortal sin.

Betsy
 
baltobetsy said:
I would also think that, unless the item was very valuable, you’re not dealing with grave matter here, either.
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This bigger issue is lying to her mother. She must have realized that was a sin at the time she did it. Whether that is mortal or venial, in this situation, I don’t know. I would think we’re dealing with commandments 4 and 8 here, on the lying, 7 on the item being trashed without her mother’s consent. So, that’s three commandments. There is also the issue of did you intentionally omit this from confession? Be honest. As for receiving communion, I don’t think anyone on this message board is qualified to search YOUR conscience. When in doubt, don’t do it, that’s what I’d recommend.
 
ChangingHeart said:
This bigger issue is lying to her mother. She must have realized that was a sin at the time she did it. Whether that is mortal or venial, in this situation, I don’t know. I would think we’re dealing with commandments 4 and 8 here, on the lying, 7 on the item being trashed without her mother’s consent. So, that’s three commandments. There is also the issue of did you intentionally omit this from confession? Be honest. As for receiving communion, I don’t think anyone on this message board is qualified to search YOUR conscience. When in doubt, don’t do it, that’s what I’d recommend.
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I was used to doing that as well, but it’s been recommended to me by good priests and even some of the saints that when in doubt it would be displeasing to God to not receive Communion.

So that’s what I have been operating on recently. 🤷
 
ckcatholic said:
This seems silly to even type, but it is really bothering me (and yes, I do have isssues with scruples). I threw away something that belonged to my mother – it was old and gross. I planned on surprising her with a new one. However, I forgot to replace it. Yesterday she asked where it was and I lied and said I didn’t know. Later I went to confession and did not confess this; I simply did not realize this was a sin until after confession. I am truly sorry.
I plan on replacing the item and admitting to my mother that I lied to her since I have a history of committing sinful behavior to cover up other sinful behavior.
My question is whether this is mortal or venial, and whether I should avoid Holy Communion today and the rest of this week until confession next Saturday. Thank you for your help.
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Hi. Not to be rough on you but does a public vote on the matter suffice - in this case or ever? If you have a history (habit?) of commiting sin to cover sin, then isn’t this clearly a matter for the confessional, for confessing to a priest who actually knows you?
 
I chose *not *to receive Communion today, treating it as a mortal sin even though it doesn’t seem grave in matter.
I was not looking for a public poll, but because of my scruples, I sometimes have a hard time distinguishing what actually constitutes a mortal sin. Also, the grace I receive from the Eucharist helps relieve the anxiety and scruples I suffer from. I guess this is an unfortunate effect of sin. It’s too bad confession is not availiable more often. Thanks for the help, though.
 
Also, to clarify, I do and did know that lying is wrong, but this just kind of popped out of my mouth, which was really weird (I’m a grown woman). I guess it shows how far I have to go in my spiritual journey that I did not think about this lie being a *sin * until after confession. I did not purposely omit it.
 
Nothing odd about you at all. It could help if you’d find a regular confessor.
I recommend it - especially if you’re dealing with scruples.
 
Lazerlike42 said:
I was used to doing that as well, but it’s been recommended to me by good priests and even some of the saints that when in doubt it would be displeasing to God to not receive Communion.

So that’s what I have been operating on recently. 🤷
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Very interesting. Do you have any Church writings in regards to this? I suffer from scruples as well, and sometimes end up not receiving Communion even when I received Penance immediately before the Mass, if there is something I genuinely forgot to confess during confession, but then remembered in between leaving the confessional and time to receive Communion.
 
ChangingHeart said:
Very interesting. Do you have any Church writings in regards to this? I suffer from scruples as well, and sometimes end up not receiving Communion even when I received Penance immediately before the Mass, if there is something I genuinely forgot to confess during confession, but then remembered in between leaving the confessional and time to receive Communion.
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Well that is a clear case of scrupulosity being displeasing to Jesus, I believe. If you genuinely forgot something, that sin, however terrible and mortal it may have been was forgiven. You are in Grace and ought to be receiving Communion. Communion is the best means for you to overcome the sins you just confessed, so not receiving when you’re perfectly ok to do so is basically passing up an opportunity to give up more of your sins.

I can point you straight to St. Faustina for this one, who was told by Christ that He was displeased with her for refraining from receiving Communion because she was unsure about her conscience. This is just a case of the classic advice for the scrupulous: if you are paying so much attention to sin that you are scrupulous, then when you commit a mortal sin you’re going to know it. You’re not going to have any doubts at all. Your average Catholic that examines his conscience maybe once a week is a different story, but a person that notices every tiny little sin is sure as heck not going to have any doubts about a mortal sin.

That’s the general principle behind it, in any case.

But certainly, when you have come out of confession and been genuinely honest in there, receive Communion. Go again and confess the thing you forgot for the sake of completeness, but don’t keep yourself from Christ when you’re in a state of Grace!
 
This might seem totally off the subject…

but

why couldn’t you simply say to your mother, “the one you had was old and gross, and you deserve so much better than that. I am planning to buy you a new one the first chance I get”.

It seems to me that not being honest and up front about something you did, which you must have thought was the right thing to do, is a problem that should be looked into. Not to pile guilt on you - that’s not my intention - but maybe the focus of this should be the relationship you have with your mother, and not worrying about whether telling her you didn’t know where “it” was is a mortal or venial sin. After all, you didn’t know EXACTLY where it was (now I’m kidding with you) since you had thrown it away, and once you throw something away it is out of sight.

All kidding aside.

If your intention was to provide your mother with a newer, better, less “old and gross” whatever it was, why not tell her that?

Sounds like you did it out of love, after all.
 
For those of you who suffer from scrupulosity, I highly recommend that you go to this web site: mission.liguori.org/newsletters/archives.htm#SA, and read the November 2005 newsletter, Was it a Mortal sin? It may help you in distinguishing between a mortal vs veniel sin. The site is a gem for those who suffer from scrupulosity.
 
IMO you have committed not two, but three sins!
  1. theft. you took something that did not belong to you. Your reasons or rational for ‘taking’ the item does not matter. You took something that did not belong to you.
  2. lying. You lied about stealing the item. Lying about it reveals that you knew you had done wrong.
  3. you failed to honor your mother both by taking something that belonged to her and in lying to her.
I used to have an old sweater that I loved. It was an old hand-me-down my mother gave me; big, bulky, waaarrrrm, and very cozy. My daughter hated to see me wear that sweater. She said it made me look like a bag-lady. So one day without asking she ‘got rid’ of the sweater. I spent hours and hours looking for it, calling family & friends to see if I’d left it at their place, looking in all the places I had been recently and checking their lost & found. Finally after days of lamenting, my daughter finally 'fessed up and said she got rid of it. Actually it was my daughter and my sister together that made that decision for me and my sister lied to me as well when I called to ask if I’d left it at her house.

It’s very disheartening when people you love and trust act in disrespectful, mistrustful ways. Now whenever I’m wearing something that they say looks ugly in the back of my mind I wonder if they’re gonna ‘get rid’ of it too. The whole thing is rather silly, but the effects are long lasting. If my daughter and sister came to me in all honesty and with true contrition then that would go a long way towards restoring trust, but since neither of them have I remain somewhat distrustful of them.

So rather than asking whether you should confess a mortal or venial sin so you can recieve communion, I think you should be asking what has brought about in you the desire to take what doesn’t belong to you, lie about it and dishonor your mother this way? Get at the root of your issue with your Mom and yourself, then with true contrition in your heart go to your mother and reconcile with her before approaching the altar.
 
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