The irrationality of mortal sin and hell

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From what I understand mortal sin will send someone to hell. If you committed a mortal sin and you haven’t been to confession you are supposed to go to hell. And if you go to confession and are absolved of your sins and then die you will go to heaven, as long as you truly seek forgiveness. Correct me if I’m wrong.

So this means that if someone dies after they masturbate, but have lived a great life of Charity and following Jesus’ commandments, they will go to hell. And if a mass murderer and child rapist goes to confession and dies shortly thereafter he will go to heaven. Am I missing something here? Eternal punishment for masturbation? Eternal reward for being sorry at the right time for a lifetime of evils? Does this actually make sense to anyone?
 
interestedman said:
From what I understand mortal sin will send someone to hell. If you committed a mortal sin and you haven’t been to confession you are supposed to go to hell. And if you go to confession and are absolved of your sins and then die you will go to heaven, as long as you truly seek forgiveness. Correct me if I’m wrong.

So this means that if someone dies after they masturbate, but have lived a great life of Charity and following Jesus’ commandments, they will go to hell. And if a mass murderer and child rapist goes to confession and dies shortly thereafter he will go to heaven. Am I missing something here? Eternal punishment for masturbation? Eternal reward for being sorry at the right time for a lifetime of evils? Does this actually make sense to anyone?
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Well the eternal punishment for one mortal sin makes sense. Someone who commits one wrong act - a vicious murder or a rape of an innocent child - will often be sentenced to life (not quite eternal, but certainly they will probably spend the remainder of their lives in jail being punished).

As for the vicious crimes being forgiven - imagine a father or mother who deeply loves their wayward child. Time and again the child rejects and hurts them. Imagine one day parent and child are in the street together and are accosted by the child’s drug dealer, who threatens to shoot the child dead because the child owes money.

Imagine the child’s life flashes before its eyes, it turns to the parent and says from its heart ‘I now truly understand how deeply I have hurt you - I am sorry beyond what words can say, and I want nothing more than to make amends to you and live decently without the drugs as far as I can do so.’

What parent, looking into its child’s eyes and seeing that the child was sincere, would not willingly take that bullet for the child to spare its life? That’s what God did, in the person of Jesus - took on himself the penalty we rightly should pay.

Imagine the same scenario, but instead imagine of expressing sorrow, the child even in this extreme last moment of life can do nothing but curse the parent, perhaps blame the parent for its predicament (even though it was none of the parent’s doing), and profess an undying hatred for the parent.

The parent might well, if it loves the child, still try to save its life - even die for it - but would they succeed? If a person is that hardened, how likely that they will ever change, no matter what attempts are made to influence them to change? Will the child not most likely still end up dead, maybe not at that moment but sooner rather than later, with that attitude?
 
As men and women of the earth, we cannot comprehend the nature of God’s mercy or his plan for any of us. Also, no one on earth can condemn someone to hell. There are numerous instances in the Bible that point out we are not to judge and condemn others because no one is sinless, therefore, the Church’s teaching is not a guaranteed go straight to hell if you commit a mortal sin without confessing. Rather, it is a teaching based on the Bible and tradition that has a very complicated history. I have always viewed it as a pretty significant guideline for my spiritual life, but in the end, if I die without the opportunity to confess, I hope and believe that God’s mercy will ultimately be what saves or condemns me. The bottom line is, there are many factors involved, many of which are impossible for us to account for in their entirety with any certainty, so we must rely on the teachings of the Church to guide us and give it our best effort to live as decent human beings with compassion for others.
 
My thoughts: Masturbating will not ncessarily send you to hell but not masturbating will definitely help you get to heaven.

Sins like masturbation are like viruses, small but potentially deadly. Is someone who dies from a virus any less dead than a man that dies at the hands of an army? It’s best to try and avoid all selfish behavior.
 
interestedman said:
From what I understand mortal sin will send someone to hell. If you committed a mortal sin and you haven’t been to confession you are supposed to go to hell. And if you go to confession and are absolved of your sins and then die you will go to heaven, as long as you truly seek forgiveness. Correct me if I’m wrong.

So this means that if someone dies after they masturbate, but have lived a great life of Charity and following Jesus’ commandments, they will go to hell. And if a mass murderer and child rapist goes to confession and dies shortly thereafter he will go to heaven. Am I missing something here? Eternal punishment for masturbation? Eternal reward for being sorry at the right time for a lifetime of evils? Does this actually make sense to anyone?
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You make simplistic generaliztions and also have left out purgatory. One’s sinnfulnes is not for us to judge. A sin does not mean a direct route to hell but certianly some time in purgatory at the very least. Confession as well is not simply a free pass and is rather a moot point if one is not truly remorseful for their sin(s) and while one who is truly repentent there still will be some time in purgatory before passing into heaven.
 
J_Peterson said:
My thoughts: Masturbating will not ncessarily send you to hell but not masturbating will definitely help you get to heaven.

Sins like masturbation are like viruses, small but potentially deadly. Is someone who dies from a virus any less dead than a man that dies at the hands of an army? It’s best to try and avoid all selfish behavior.
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If any mortal sin is left unconfessed/unrepented of, than it does in fact mean that the one who committed it is going to Hell. Of course, the Confession (or perfect act of contrition if there is no possible way of going to Confession) has to be genuine and for the right reasons (in the case of Sacramental Confession, being sorry for at least one spiritual reason and in the case of a perfect act of contrition, the main reason has to be because the mortal sin offended God.)
 
LilyM said:
Well the eternal punishment for one mortal sin makes sense. Someone who commits one wrong act - a vicious murder or a rape of an innocent child - will often be sentenced to life (not quite eternal, but certainly they will probably spend the remainder of their lives in jail being punished).

As for the vicious crimes being forgiven - imagine a father or mother who deeply loves their wayward child. Time and again the child rejects and hurts them. Imagine one day parent and child are in the street together and are accosted by the child’s drug dealer, who threatens to shoot the child dead because the child owes money.

Imagine the child’s life flashes before its eyes, it turns to the parent and says from its heart ‘I now truly understand how deeply I have hurt you - I am sorry beyond what words can say, and I want nothing more than to make amends to you and live decently without the drugs as far as I can do so.’

What parent, looking into its child’s eyes and seeing that the child was sincere, would not willingly take that bullet for the child to spare its life? That’s what God did, in the person of Jesus - took on himself the penalty we rightly should pay.

Imagine the same scenario, but instead imagine of expressing sorrow, the child even in this extreme last moment of life can do nothing but curse the parent, perhaps blame the parent for its predicament (even though it was none of the parent’s doing), and profess an undying hatred for the parent.

The parent might well, if it loves the child, still try to save its life - even die for it - but would they succeed? If a person is that hardened, how likely that they will ever change, no matter what attempts are made to influence them to change? Will the child not most likely still end up dead, maybe not at that moment but sooner rather than later, with that attitude?
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This!
👍
Beautifully Put.
 
I’ve had similar questions and posted related to it just recently in the Spirituality forum.

I think I’m approaching a glimmer of understanding regarding this topic.

Many of our sins are an outgrowth of our habits. If we practice virtues (doing good and making daily choices to follow the commandments and loving God), then we will grow in holiness and will become less and less likely to choose sin. So we will be in the habit of choosing God, not choosing evil at the end of our lives. We are only able to really choose God if we are surrendered to Him (thus we must have belief in Jesus and his saving work and yield to it each day).

At the end of life,we have the final choice to choose God or not God. What we choose at that point will be dictated by our habits up until that point. So if we have been choosing God all along (though still failing at times because of our humanness) we will be saved and go either to heaven or purgatory (purgatory is to be cleansed of the parts of us that still need it before we spend eternity with God who is all holy and cannot touch anything unclean).

But-- if we have been choosing evil all along(through our daily choices and habits) then we will naturally choose evil at that point of time and will spend eternity without God, but enveloped in our evil. That is why you hear people say WE choose hell for ourselves, not God.

Now it is for certain a journey. At least for me it is. Maybe some people never turned their backs on God or had a really close relationship with him from childhood, but for me, I’ve gradually grown in my knowledge and love of God throughout my life (and still have a long way to go). So if I masturbate (to use your example) and then get hit by a bus crossing the street, I have to trust God that He sees my heart and knows that I fell out of weakness and that my heart is turned to Him and my goal is to be closer to Him and to follow Him.

This is the only way I can make sense of it at this point. If I read all the “doctrines” about it, I just get confused. I believe part of it is the inadequacy of language. We can only state things in words and we pore over the doctrine and catechism trying to understand every single word, when it is really intended to present Truths.

I could be wrong of course, too.
 
LilyM said:
Well the eternal punishment for one mortal sin makes sense. Someone who commits one wrong act - a vicious murder or a rape of an innocent child - will often be sentenced to life (not quite eternal, but certainly they will probably spend the remainder of their lives in jail being punished).

As for the vicious crimes being forgiven - imagine a father or mother who deeply loves their wayward child. Time and again the child rejects and hurts them. Imagine one day parent and child are in the street together and are accosted by the child’s drug dealer, who threatens to shoot the child dead because the child owes money.

Imagine the child’s life flashes before its eyes, it turns to the parent and says from its heart ‘I now truly understand how deeply I have hurt you - I am sorry beyond what words can say, and I want nothing more than to make amends to you and live decently without the drugs as far as I can do so.’

What parent, looking into its child’s eyes and seeing that the child was sincere, would not willingly take that bullet for the child to spare its life? That’s what God did, in the person of Jesus - took on himself the penalty we rightly should pay.

Imagine the same scenario, but instead imagine of expressing sorrow, the child even in this extreme last moment of life can do nothing but curse the parent, perhaps blame the parent for its predicament (even though it was none of the parent’s doing), and profess an undying hatred for the parent.

The parent might well, if it loves the child, still try to save its life - even die for it - but would they succeed? If a person is that hardened, how likely that they will ever change, no matter what attempts are made to influence them to change? Will the child not most likely still end up dead, maybe not at that moment but sooner rather than later, with that attitude?
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That is a great way to understand it. Thanks for that, I’ve never really been able to put the doctrine into words.
 
You used the example of Masturbation.
This is taught to always be “Gravely Disordered”. That means it is capable of being a Mortal Sin. Note: that is not the same thing as always being a mortal sin!!!

This is what the catechism says:
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."138 “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."139
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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.
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Therefore: depending on the situation masturbation, while always “gravely disordered”, may depending on the circumstances only constitute a sin of “minimum” seriousness on the individual involved… It may be that this is due to the effects of other serious sins or illnesses.

The same principal applies to many other sins… especially ones which can be very habitual.
To commit a Mortal Sin (whatever the grave action involved) a person must:
  1. Know it is a Sin
  2. Intend to commit the sin
  3. have opportunity to adequately reflect on his (/her) intended actions
  4. act with full and free consent of the will.
It’s not just giving in to temptation. it’s saying to God: I know this will hurt you (or me, or another person) but I want to do it and I’m going to do it anyway… you can just lump it.
 
I am no theologian but my view is more like this:

One is tempted to self-gratify. He knows in his heart and in his mind that it is grave matter to do so. He understnads the church’s teachings as to why. He says to himself, I am going to turn my back on the church’s teaching on the matter, willfully and with full consent and go ahead and givin to my temptation. → likely mortal sin.

One is tempted to self-gratify. He knows in his heart and in his mind that it is grave matter to do so. He understnads the church’s teachings as to why. He attempts to avoid the temptation. He regretfully gives in due to his weakness. Following he is remorseful and regretful. he wishes he were stronger → unlikely mortal sin, yet still sin of grave matter.

My reasoning, His consent was less then “full”.

Again - no theologian here
 
Perplexity said:
interested man: :clapping:
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Not so fast, Interestedman and Perplexity! 😉

In addition to the parent/child analogy given by LilyM, let me add another perspective…

Interested – what you’re doing here is attempting to ask whether the smallest possible mortal sin is still mortal, and whether the biggest possible forgiven mortal sin is still forgiven. Phrased in the way that you chose, it almost seems illogical. However, I think it’s necessary to understand what ‘mortal sin’ means, if we’re going to make sense of it.

I don’t need to add to LilyM’s description of forgiveness – I think it beautifully answers your question about the greatest mortal sin that has been forgiven.

However, there’s still the matter of “the smallest possible mortal sin”. Let’s stop for a second, and ask ourselves what that phrase means. In the context of the Catholic Church, a mortal sin is one that severs the relationship with God. So, your question reduces down to “if my relationship with God is completely severed at the end of my life, will I go to hell?” Put this way, the question kinda answers itself, don’t you think?

As to the justice of such a concept, let me provide an example: many families have their own feuds; some of these start over large issues, but I bet that many of us can provide a ton of examples of life-long feuds that are based in the most trivial of reasons. So, let’s consider this as an example (and I’ll make it extreme in order to make it obvious how it fits your question). Suppose that I’m estranged from my parents because I caught my dad and my wife in bed. Further suppose that my sister is also estranged from my parents because she feels that they were mean to her as a teen. On the other hand, my brother has his little disagreements with my parents, but hasn’t ever totally broken off the relationship with them. Now, suppose my dad and I have a sit-down, talk things through, and reconcile. Shortly thereafter, my parents die.

How can we characterize the state of the relationships? My relationship with my parents exists, even though there had been a serious breach in the relationship at one point. My sister’s relationship is non-existent, even though the reason for it is relatively more trivial than the one I had experienced. My brother’s relationship with my parents exists, although we’re not really saying what the current state of the quality of the relationship is.

At the end of the day, the relationship is what it is. Would a loving parent wish that his relationships with all his children exist and be of high quality? Of course. Can a loving parent force his (adult) children to have a relationship with him? Of course not. Is this unfair? No; if you wish to demonstrate that it’s unfair, you’ll need to explain why… 😉
 
Gorgias said:
Not so fast, Interestedman and Perplexity! 😉

At the end of the day, the relationship is what it is. Would a loving parent wish that his relationships with all his children exist and be of high quality? Of course. Can a loving parent force his (adult) children to have a relationship with him? Of course not. Is this unfair? No; if you wish to demonstrate that it’s unfair, you’ll need to explain why… 😉
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Again: Nice illustration of the point. 👍

I love hearing or reading other people draw these illustrations on this issue.
 
Gorgias said:
to “if my relationship with God is completely severed at the end of my life, will I go to hell?” Put this way, the question kinda answers itself, don’t you think?
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Very helpful, the analogy of the parents too. 👍
 
The question does not consider all the factors.

First, God and God alone chooses when to call a soul to judgment. That He calls some after repentance and others before, is not grounds for us to complain. We have no “right” to salvation, it is first and last a gift of God.

Second, God alone judges the state of a soul. The worst sinner can have the brightest soul after true repentance. The least sinner can have a truly dead soul, even in the hypothetical mastubator’s situation, if he has repeatedly refused the grace to do better, or perhaps has become presumptuous that God surely will not call him to account before giving him a chance to get to confession.

The bottom line is we know neither the day nor the hour when we will be called to account. God asks us not to deliberately commit serious sin. Masturbation is a serious sin. If, as others have mentioned, it is committed with full knowledge and consent of the will (something knowable ultimately only to God), then yes, such a person will be granted his desire–to not be with God. God doesn’t reject the sinner, the sinner has rejected God.

The question also seems to imply that God would act arbitrarily and without proportion. Of course, God knows each soul perfectly, and is not seeking to entrap someone into damnation. But He will also respect the human freedom He gave us and permit us to sin. The choice to sin is first and last, ours. We cannot be heard to complain if God calls any of us to judgment after He’s clearly told us that 1) we must not sin, especially grievously, if we hope to gain heaven and 2) we cannot presume on his grace to obtain forgiveness before we die, since we do not know the day nor the hour.

Trust in God is necessary, and not on our fallible and imperfect sense of “justice.” The only thing we truly “deserve” is hell. Salvation is truly a gift of God and not ours by right.
 
interestedman said:
From what I understand mortal sin will send someone to hell. If you committed a mortal sin and you haven’t been to confession you are supposed to go to hell. And if you go to confession and are absolved of your sins and then die you will go to heaven, as long as you truly seek forgiveness. Correct me if I’m wrong.

So this means that if someone dies after they masturbate, but have lived a great life of Charity and following Jesus’ commandments, they will go to hell. And if a mass murderer and child rapist goes to confession and dies shortly thereafter he will go to heaven. Am I missing something here? Eternal punishment for masturbation? Eternal reward for being sorry at the right time for a lifetime of evils? Does this actually make sense to anyone?
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Yes, you are missing something.

Is there some point in your life where you’re no longer allowed to make free choices? Because you’ve always driven red cars, are you now prevented from ever choosing a blue car? One can always make a choice for God or against God, regardless of their past choices.

Oh and BTW, masturbation is not ipso facto a mortal sin. Even many Catholics get this wrong. A mortal sin requires grave matter, full knowledge and full consent. So even your example fails to support your point.

What you are really arguing is that somebody who has truly chosen God for a lifetime, will just casually throw that away one day. Do you believe this? Is this the way people work? Does a patriot one day casually become a traitor with full knowledge and consent? Does a loving husband one day casually divorce his wife with full knowledge and consent? Does a loving mother one day casually abandon her children with full knowledge and consent?

Further, do you believe that God, who is omniscient and omnibenevolent, who knows that Joe would repent of his mortal sin later, would play “gotcha!” and let him die before that moment, without a chance to repent? That God, who wants us to be saved more than we want to be saved, who loves us more than we love ourselves, would casually toss people into hell because of the equivalent of being a day late on their car payment? Why do you believe this?

Yes, you are indeed missing something.
 
Mijoy2 said:
I am no theologian but my view is more like this:

One is tempted to self-gratify. He knows in his heart and in his mind that it is grave matter to do so. He understnads the church’s teachings as to why. He says to himself, I am going to turn my back on the church’s teaching on the matter, willfully and with full consent and go ahead and givin to my temptation. → likely mortal sin.

One is tempted to self-gratify. He knows in his heart and in his mind that it is grave matter to do so. He understnads the church’s teachings as to why. He attempts to avoid the temptation. He regretfully gives in due to his weakness. Following he is remorseful and regretful. he wishes he were stronger → unlikely mortal sin, yet still sin of grave matter.

My reasoning, His consent was less then “full”.

Again - no theologian here
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It sounds like in most such situations, that actually would be mortally sinful. I mean if the person knows what their doing is wrong and is not dreaming, half-asleep, drunk or on drugs, the consent would most likely be full.
 
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