Thoughts on this Scrupulous Anonymous post?

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MariaRita5

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I’m a scrupulous person myself, but this article about thoughts doesn’t seem to match my understanding of what the Church teaches. We pray the Confiteor at Mass: “I have greatly sinned in my THOUGHTS and in my words, in what I have done and what I have failed to do.” This article seems to imply that NO thoughts are sins. But that can’t be right, since Jesus said that anyone who lusts after a woman commits adultery in his heart, and He also rebukes the Pharisees saying, “Why do you think evil in your hearts?” I like Scrupulous Anonymous, but I don’t know if this article goes too far. I don’t want to fall into error or recommend Scrupulous Anonymous to anyone else if they are in error. I’d like to get some (name removed by moderator)ut from other Catholics about this.

Here’s the article: Thoughts on Thinking – Scrupulous Anonymous
 
MariaRita5 said:
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Actual sin is always voluntary. When a thought occurs for something sinful, there is a time before it is rejected or accepted to be dwelt upon. When the sin occurs is when there is sufficient reflection for it to be a personal choice. For example, about mortal sin, from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
1859 Mortal sin requires full knowledge and complete consent . It presupposes knowledge of the sinful character of the act, of its opposition to God’s law. It also implies a consent sufficiently deliberate to be a personal choice. …
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There can be venial sin with partial consent, yet that is still consent.
 
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Right, I understand this. But my point is that this article seems to say that even willful thoughts, deliberately generated thoughts, are not sinful. He seems to be saying that NO thoughts are sinful. He also said that thoughts that are willed and thoughts that are involuntary are essentially the same.
 
The author also said somewhere “these are my opinions”.
 
If I have a impure thought , and according to this author’s logic, it wouldn’t be a sin at all. Meaning I found a loophole in God’s law. In God’s law, there exist 0 loopholes. The thought could be a sexual thought or any other thought. See where I’m going here? If i follow this person’s logic, not only is there a loophole in God’s law, but I’m choosing myself over God.
 
That’s kind of what I thought. I understand that bad thoughts are not necessarily sins, but are only so if we dwell on them, extend them further, etc. or will them ourselves. Following Father Santa’s logic, even the thoughts that I will or entertain are not sinful, which can’t possibly be correct.
 
The author of this is completely wrong. In my Catechism book it states , “any willful thought, desire, word , action, or omission forbidden by the law of God is a Actual Sin.” So it is a to have sin to have a willful thought that goes against God’s Law. I do not know the reason why the author would say this.

Maybe you should not read any Articles from this person and do a background check on them (:
 
I’m just going to not read anymore from Scrupulous Anonymous, nor recommend it to anyone else. The more I think about this, the clearer it becomes that despite the author’s insistence that his teaching is orthodox what he is teaching is clearly not good for souls.
 
Since I am not a believer and therefore do not use ‘sin’ as a category I have no opinion on this. I do think it is not in line with what I understand to be Catholic though suspect there is more to it.

I also think it is unwise to write an article for people with OCD which does not distinguish between ‘intrusive’ thoughts and other thinking and implies that there is, routinely, control over thoughts that com to mind.
 
The author of the article is a priest named Fr Thomas Santa, who devotes his ministry to helping the scrupulous.

He is writing it with the scrupulous in mind.
 
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Random thoughts that go on subconsciously aren’t sins. I have definitely wondered at times though.
 
If you are scrupulous, you should not be asking questions about Scrupulous Anonymous materials on this forum. It would be best if you discussed them with the priest with whom you are working on your scrupulosity.

Lay people who post here may mean well but actually make your condition worse. It’s disturbing to me that somebody posted on here his opinion of what a sin is and that he motivated you to no longer want to read Scrupulous Anonymous materials. That’s a good example of why people shouldn’t be discussing scrupulosity with scrupulous posters on here.

Please speak to your priest about the article in question. Do not take the advice from random strangers on the internet.
 
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