The list of mortal sins seems too harsh

[HeartnSoulMan]

There was a saint who was allowed in visions to travel to hell and she was allowed to question some of the people there. The youngest person she discovered in hell was eight years of age at her death. A little girl. She had committed only one mortal sin before her death. She had taken God’s name in vain.

God does not mess around with sin. All the commandments are commandments. They are not suggestions. The same gravity is applied to the teachings of the Catholic Church they are like commandments to us. God takes them that seriously. So should we.

The weak will fail because they did not recognize that strength comes from the grace of God alone. This grace we need for strength begins in the sacraments.

 

[Evania]

There was a saint who was allowed in visions to travel to hell and she was allowed to question some of the people there. The youngest person she discovered in hell was eight years of age at her death. A little girl. She had committed only one mortal sin before her death. She had taken God’s name in vain.

Can you provide this saint’s name? I would like to read about it.

An eight year old little girl is suffering eternity in hell for taking God’s name in vain one time? I would think that the little girl would at the very least go to Purgatory. This doesn’t seem consistent with the messages given to St. Faustina regarding Divine Mercy.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

It’s a valid hypothetical whether you believe or not. We don’t always have full information about everything and we still make choices we either love or regret.

Yes, this is exactly the case. The point is that one can/should/must be judged based upon the information that one has. If a child or a mentally retarded person pulls a trigger and kills someone then the act is judged differently because of the ignorance.

And there is zero information about God. It is all surmised by fallible human beings. No one is qualified to speak for God. Not the pope, not the church, not the “magisterium”.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

I believe the name of the Saint was St. Theresa D’Avila.

For the other query. After the resurrection Jesus set up His Church. Jesus appeared to St. Peter gave him his new name from Simon to Peter the rock and set His church upon this rock. Then He said, I give to you the keys to the kingdom of Heaven whatsoever you bind on earth is bound in Heaven and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

This does not just cover the power to forgive sin or make law. Both of which it does but to a first century Jew it would have a great amount more meaning. It would be obvious to them that Jesus was referring to the system used by His ancestor David in the ruling of David’s kingdom.

King David set up a council to run his kingdom. The council had equal power to the king to decide anything necessary to rule his kingdom reporting only to David.

He place one man in charge of this council who was understood to not just be in charge but to have equal power to the king in all things except the king himself. This persons’ position on the council was called the keeper of the keys. He was presented with keys to all the buildings possessed by the king including the castle.

If we understand that this reference about giving Peter the keys to the kingdom means that a council was formed to run Christ kingdom with equal authority to Christ to do so. They have absolute power to make law or bind law the same for sin. The head of that council has absolute power over the council and the kingdom, The pope is the keeper of the keys.

The pope and the council not only have the right and responsibility to make and enforce law but God will make sure that no one escapes their authority at their personal judgement.

We need to take the Church seriously but we are also taught by our Holy Mother the church that if anyone with authority over us tells us to do something that is sinful then we must refuse and we no longer owe that individual obedience in that matter.

In today’s church there are good people and good priests etc there are also bad ones this is just natural the teachings of the Church help us understand the difference.

 

[ALoveDivine]

I don’t like the terms “mortal” and “venial” for two reasons.

1. “Mortal” implies that we on this earth can know with certainty the judgement of God to be delivered unto a person who commits a certain sin. Yet scripture and evident reasons are both clear that judgement belongs to God alone, and even the church teaches that no one can know who is in Heaven or Hell. Certainly God has the power to mercifully forgive a person of his “mortal” sins and purify him en route to heaven after death. That is God’s prerogative and it is none of our business to speculate about.

“Grave” sin is a better word honestly. We can certainly know, via conscience, scripture, and tradition, that certain sins are very serious. It does not however immediately follow that God will always eternally condemn the one who commits said sins, even with full knowledge and consent. Let us not presume to know how God will judge an individual soul.

And before anyone tries to chastise me for this, take into account that many, many eastern rite Catholics do not hold to this dichotomy as it is not part of the eastern theological and spiritual tradition, traditions which have in fact been accepted as valid by the Church. The “mortal/venial” distinction is a Latin theological construct, along with notions such as “temporal punishment due to sin” and “treasury of merits” etc.

1. “Venial” implies that the sins which it describes aren’t a big deal. Scripture is clear that ALL sin is sin against God and is a serious matter. This notion of “venial” sins implies that one can simply ignore these types of sins in their life because they aren’t a big deal. It’s hard to see how such a conception could lead one to greater holiness.

 

[Mystrx]

There was a saint who was allowed in visions to travel to hell and she was allowed to question some of the people there. The youngest person she discovered in hell was eight years of age at her death. A little girl. She had committed only one mortal sin before her death. She had taken God’s name in vain.

God does not mess around with sin. All the commandments are commandments. They are not suggestions. The same gravity is applied to the teachings of the Catholic Church they are like commandments to us. God takes them that seriously. So should we.

The weak will fail because they did not recognize that strength comes from the grace of God alone. This grace we need for strength begins in the sacraments.

Correct.

 

[multitude]

And there is zero information about God. It is all surmised by fallible human beings. No one is qualified to speak for God. Not the pope, not the church, not the “magisterium”.

C’mon. If that is what you really believe, I doubt you would be here on CAF. What would be the point, other than a good debate, or maybe even pretending to be intellectually superior to religious folk? I don’t go looking for information where none exists. That would be irrational.

I suppose you can argue that there is information in the sense that you’re looking for information on those who believe in God, but not necessarily information on God. However, we all get information about all sorts of things from other human beings, so it isn’t as if there is no precedent.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

The term mortal is used because when we are in a state of sanctifying grace we are alive to God and when we commit a mortal sin then we lose access to this grace and are dead to God.

You are very confused about this idea of judgement which seems to be a worldwide phenomena. Judgement is just about all we do. We judge everything. We judge what smells good and what or who doesn’t We judge who is tall or short pretty or pretty ugly. We judge who to hire and who to let go. We judge who to let care for our kids and who we don’t trust to do so.

This is all absolutely necessary. We must judge what is moral from what is not moral. This includes not just our actions be everyone’s we witness.

The Church speaks for God They make a law God will punish you for breaking it. God will not save anyone who dies with an repented mortal sin on their soul. He respects our freedom even to make us His enemies. God hates both the sin and the sinner repulses Him.

The Church has determined that certain sins are so bad that even if the person does not meet the normal three criteria to commit a mortal sin it is still a mortal sin. They do not know if as you are dying before you die that you don’t make an act of contrition. But that does not mean that we don’t know when people commit sins capable of sending them to hell. The sin and the person can be healed but we cannot pretend that serious sins are all venial. We would have to know in some cases if the other criteria like knowledge and will were included in the culpability to determine if the sin was mortal. This is all normal stuff for humans to know.

We do not know what happens inside the heart and mind but sometimes we are allowed to know. People sometimes admit to you why they did what they did. I was once told that if God allows us to witness another persons mortal sins it is so you can pray for them not so that you can blab it around town.

The real problem with judgement is best seen in the story of Adam an Eve. Adam and Eve in a state of original justice are given by God one commandment. Immediately they rush off to place themselves in close proximity like we talk about a near occasion of sin.

Then we see the devil tells them that God has only given them this one commandment because He is a tyrant who wants to control them forever. He has restricted the tree because if they eat from it they will become like God’s themselves and He will no longer have power over them. So they first judged God to be an evil tyrant instead of a loving creator.

Before every serious sin is committed the individual judges God. That He is powerless to prevent us, That he makes life too hard. That he is not the kind of God we want. That he is too weak and passive to actually condemn us to hell.etc etc etc.

These are the only false judgments that we have been warned about making. Judging each other is not only natural but necessary how would you know who to instruct or to visit or too feed either physically or spiritually.

 

[ALoveDivine]

You’ve masterfully summarized the Latin theological framework under-girding the concepts of “mortal” and “venial” sins. Cool. But its ultimately irrelevant. Most of the Eastern Rites do not share this theological framework at all.

We agree that some sins are very serious and must be healed through sacramental absolution before one can receive communion. That is Catholic faith. Don’t equate this with a particular theological explanatory framework, as if that framework itself was universally binding on the whole church, including the eastern rites, or that it is infallible.

We share the same substance of faith, though theological frameworks differ. Unity in legitimate diversity, the ecumenical principle essential to the unity of the church. I side with the east on this issue.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

Certainly I covered mortal and venial sin which separate the ones you don’t need confession before communion from the ones you do. Because confession must in its absolution return you to a state capable of communing with God.

The point I was making was not about the quality of sin but of the mistake as to what judgement we are not supposed to make. It is not about judging people it is about not judging God falsely. I am sorry you got so caught up in the depth of specific teaching that you failed to see the point I was trying to make.

We have to judge and in matters of faith and morals the pope is infallible even in the eastern rites of the Catholic Church. If by eastern you mean orthodox then we are not really talking Catholic ideology at all.

It is my opinion that apostolic descent does not guarantee membership in the one true Church only the validity of the sacraments. Infallibility goes only with the keeper of the keys. His rulings all men will be judged for based on Catholic teaching concerning their knowledge, intention, conscience etc.

 

[ALoveDivine]

Certainly I covered mortal and venial sin which separate the ones you don’t need confession before communion from the ones you do. Because confession must in its absolution return you to a state capable of communing with God.

And on this we completely agree. You use “mortal” and “venial”, I would say “grave” and…well, other sins. Difference in conceptualization and terminology does not make a difference in faith

It is not about judging people it is about not judging God falsely.

Ok…The judgement I was speaking about was presuming to know how God will judge an individual who dies based on the sins he committed. Protestants do this all the time, I’ve even heard them say that someone who dies without being “born again” (aka emotional experience) is undoubtedly in Hell. This is obviously an error. Likewise I think it is an error to say that someone died and is in Hell now because he was sleeping with his girlfriend or something. Was he in grave sin? Yes. May he end up condemned? Yes. Will he with certainty be condemned and can we know that? Absolutely not. That is my only point.

Is it so wrong to hope in the tender mercy of God? My greatest hope of all is that the mercy of God will surprise all of us at the end, and a vast multitude will ultimately attain to theosis.

We have to judge and in matters of faith and morals the pope is infallible even in the eastern rites of the Catholic Church.

When infallibility is specifically invoked in the context of an “ex cathedra” statement. A pope is not infallible at all times and in all statements. Even encyclicals and papal bulls can err.

If by eastern you mean orthodox then we are not really talking Catholic ideology at all.

No, I mean Eastern Catholic. Those who hold to an eastern Christian theological paradigm and an ‘orthodox’ spirituality, yet who are in communion with the Bishop of Rome, who is the head Bishop of the church, the Servant of the Servants of God.

His rulings all men will be judged for based on Catholic teaching concerning their knowledge, intention, conscience etc.

The pope is the visible center of ecclesial unity, the final arbiter, and the guardian of Christian orthodoxy. He is the head Bishop of the Church, in the same way as Peter was the head of the Apostles. He is not a monarchical dictator relegating Bishops to mere vicars of himself. He is the leader of the Bishops of the Church within an overarching collegial framework. Otherwise, why even have ecumenical councils?

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

I sorry I was just talking discussion english instead of debate English.

Sin is interesting in that if our sins are regretted it leads to remorse, contrition and confession.

If sin is enjoyed as we see in today’s world where people publicly announce their sinfulness and their happiness to be involved. For example statement from monsignor in Rome that he is happy to state that he is a practicing homosexual. When people are happy with their sin then their involvement in their own salvation disappears.

A saint once asked about homosexuals stated not to worry about them because they are just people who have nothing to do with salvation. The statement implies that he means practicing homosexuals who are happy in their sinfulness. This statement is still true not just about homosexuality but anyone who is happy to be involved in any consistent sinful lifestyle even divorced remarried persons, civil unions, common law, drug addicts and dealers etc don’t forget lawyer and politicians etc. I think we called this as kids taking Catechism “Habitual Sin” with the understanding that they do not regret the sin. Even habitual sin can be regretted on a regular basis by someone bearing a heavy natural cross,.

If a person reaches the point of death with even one unforgiven or unrepented mortal sin or in your case serious or grievous sin on their soul they will be damned. Between dying and death anything can happen which we may or may not be allowed to witness depending on God’s intent.

Hell is definitely not empty and I don’t think we can know which place will end up with the most residents. Angels are by nature our superiors but at least one third were cast out. I sort of believe but cannot state with certainty that the mortals saved will fill the places lost by the fallen angels.

.

 

[ALoveDivine]

If a person reaches the point of death with even one unforgiven or unrepented mortal sin or in your case serious or grievous sin on their soul they will be damned

I agreed with you completely up until this point. So you are saying that God CANNOT show mercy to this person and save them? You are making a claim of certainty that God WILL, 100% damn them? If you want to believe that, ok, but I cannot be so presumptuous as to make claims about who God will or will not damn or save. That is for him to decide, and I believe he will judge each soul on a case-by-case basis.

Also, given that we know God is love and that he is abundantly merciful, I’m not sure its quite as bleak for us sinful humans as you are making it out to be. After all, what does the scripture say? Christ died to save SINNERS, he is not willing that any should perish, God so loved the world! Do you really want to put God in a box and put a conceptualized limit upon his abundant mercies? I don’t. I trust that God will do what is right, and I don’t go beyond that at all.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

My friend God is Love, God id Justice. God is holiness God is holy anger.

God is not responsible for people sinning against him, He is not guilty of human respect.

Everyone will be judged individually as well as generally at the final general judgement but God cannot give freedom to someone who has imprisoned themselves in mortal sin. Up to the last moment anything can happen but there will be no forgiveness for fallen angels or for those who have chosen to permanently defy God.

They alone chose to carry their sin to the grave. I think up until then God will forgive any sincere even momentary sorrow for sin but he cannot do it for us. Otherwise we really don’t have free wills and he has only made puppets. We were created responsible for all our choices. This is after all a moral universe made for grownups.

I don’t think free will shall continue to exist after the point of death. You seem to be suggesting that a person can hate God until they die then see that it is all real then convert fat chance that anything like that would be just.God cannot be unjust either.

By the way the Church teaches that Hell is God’s last mercy for the damned.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

C’mon. If that is what you really believe, I doubt you would be here on CAF. What would be the point, other than a good debate, or maybe even pretending to be intellectually superior to religious folk? I don’t go looking for information where none exists. That would be irrational.

I suppose you can argue that there is information in the sense that you’re looking for information on those who believe in God, but not necessarily information on God.

That is exactly right. There is an interesting phenomenon here… why do people believe in nonexistent entities? And how can they believe in contradictions? What mechanism do they use to maintain their sanity when they use the Orwellian doublethink? I suspect that the first line of defense is to DENY that they employ doublethink (which is only possible by employing doublethink). The next line is to deny that contradictions actually exist - usually by redefining them to be “mysteries”. Just look at the innumerable instances when “mystery” is invoked.

Then come the redefinition of everyday words, like “good” or “goodness”. As they say: “God is not a superman, with some superhuman attributes”. God’s “goodness” is not like human “goodness” amplified and extended to some incredible degree. God’s “goodness” is qualitatively different. But in that case the apologist cannot use "good: in conjunction with God. Yet, they do.

And all these people are perfectly sane (in every other instance). Amazing!

However, we all get information about all sorts of things from other human beings, so it isn’t as if there is no precedent.

For sure. But there is one difference. When you get information from other people on some natural phenomenon, the chain of “authorities” is finite. There must be some person who can do more than just declare: “because I said so” or “because the pope / magisterium is infallible (in the case of faith and morals)”. He is able to demonstrate what he asserts, and does not require you to grant an a-priori acceptance of his claims.

As the contemporary philosopher Stephen Toulmin says:
The existence of God … is not something to demand evidence for; nor is the
sentence, “God exists,” one to be believed if, and only if, the evidence for its truth
is good enough. The very last question to ask about God is whether He exists.
Rather, we must first accept the notion of “God”: and then we shall be in a position
to point to evidences of His existence.
This is incredible. Only the kinds of charlatans like Uri Geller have the audacity to demand: “you must believe in the paranormal first”, and then look at my demonstration of it. No wonder they never perform when actual stage magicians are present.

So it is interesting to see how the apologists attempt to convince the audience about the veracity of their claims. That is all. Now, theoretically it is possible that there exists some deistic, non-material entity, which set the “ball” into motion. Maybe there is, and there can be a rational (non faith based) demonstration of it. If so, I would gladly change my world-view from atheist to deist. But there is very little chance of that. However, as a staunch skeptic, I must stay open to the possibility that I am in error.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

My friend to question the existence of God is like closing your eyes and thinking the world no longer exists.

We know prime cause, it cannot be denied because of one reason it is the only way anything could exist and us be here to witness it. There had to be a first moment for motion and time was a natural bi-product of the original motion enduring.

Universal law physics, For there to be a motion there must be an external cause.

That means of course that something had to exist not in motion that had the power to cause or create the first motion. The motion can be amply shown to be an intellectual motion.

We call that thing that existed and had the power to cause the first motion God.

What we can knew about God came for many centuries only from gleaming the intellectual motion he began.

After Jesus came and established the undeniable fact that he is God, our knowledge grew exponentially through public and private revelation, spiritual direction, and personal relationship with God.

If you take the few years to study those things that you must have missed you will understand.

 

[Mystrx]

Its simple.

We are bound as Catholics to follow the churches lead on this, and what they say is,
a person who dies with a mortal sin, and who remains unrepentant or is unforgiven goes straight to hell.

God wills as He does, obviously, and if He chooses to pardon a sin here and there as you transition into death, then that’s what He’ll do. :getholy:

However we are obligated to believe that a mortal sin condemns us unequivocally to hell. Why? Because that’s what is taught to us by the church.

You don’t get to pick and choose which sin is more tolerable to God. :dts:

:twocents:

 

[ALoveDivine]

We are bound as Catholics to follow the churches lead on this, and what they say is,
a person who dies with a mortal sin, and who remains unrepentant or is unforgiven goes straight to hell.

And remains unforgiven, that is the key part. Who are we to say whether a person was unforgiven or not? Perhaps in demonstration of his mercy God forgave said person, even though they died in mortal sin. Do you rule out that possibility entirely?

God wills as He does, obviously, and if He chooses to pardon a sin here and there as you transition into death, then that’s what He’ll do.

Why can’t we just leave it at that?

However we are obligated to believe that a mortal sin condemns us unequivocally to hell. Why? Because that’s what is taught to us by the church.

I guess the Church may as well excommunicate the entire Eastern Rite then, and abandon all ecumenical efforts with the Orthodox. Eastern Christians DO NOT follow this kind of theological framework, ok, they just don’t. I side with them on this.

You don’t get to pick and choose which sin is more tolerable to God.

No, but we can trust in his mercy and refuse to speculate on how will judge a soul.

 

[HeartnSoulMan]

At death each individual goes for immediate personal judgement. If you have a mortal sin on your soul it won’t evaporate. That means specifically that you did not regret it. You never expressed sorrow for having infinitely offended God.

When God is offended by a mortal sin He is infinitely offended. In God everything is infinite.

That is why the infinite sacrifice was required for any sin to be potentially absolved. It would be unjust for God to forgive someone who had committed a mortal sin and had never repented. God could not be unjust. His Mercy cannot trump His justice. He makes big concessions like forgiving us infinite offences just because we feel finitely though sincerely sorry equal to about 0% of the offence to God.

God cannot throw away rules, commandments or justice after the fact. Anything is possible before death only judgement is possible after.That is where the old expression came from Where there’s’ life there’s’ hope.

Wouldn’t it be nice to believe that God has a confession beside His seat of judgement and that you can go to confession at any time even after you’ve been condemned to hell and just fix it right up.

I had a boss who believed that because Jesus died for sin so all sin is pre-forgiven and all of us just go to heaven and we are free to sin as much as we like. Just an old time heresy still alive in the present day.

Either case makes Gods’ Will, His crucifixion, and His church all redundant. God gives you a lifetime of hints, clues, helps, graces, and inspirations: and is always available to help and forgive you but it is not enough, you want God to throw away knowledge, justice and fair play then you expect that He must sin against Divine Justice just to hope that somehow you can still get away with intentionally offending God.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

… we can trust in his mercy and refuse to speculate on how will judge a soul.

Yes!

Now the list referred to is a list of grave matter as pointed out in post 3 of the thread. As pointed out, it is not a list of mortal sins.

There’s a lot in life that’s not grave matter!