Read my post.
I’m sure that there are Catholics who believe this and there are probably some Catholic teachers who have made this claim, but that is not actually a teaching of the Catholic Church.
It is not, for example, a doctrine that masturbation is a mortal sin. In addition, the whole concept of mortal sin involves a general attitude of the person (or, if one prefers that language), the person’s soul. To be a mortal sin, any act must be grievous, the person committing it must be aware of the gravity of the situation, and the person must choose to perform the act in full knowledge that s/he is deliberately choosing to spite God.
I don’t believe you need to “return” to the church, but it is a shame you appear to have had such crappy teachers explaining the actual doctrines of the church.
Some of us think he’s had a few fairly nasty reincarnations, and has more of the same in store for a while…
Hold on there. You go from the already dubious statements about “most Christian sects” in the first paragraph to the sweeping “Christianity” in the second paragraph. Can you find even one major Christian theologian who advocates the idea that simple belief in Christ sends a person straight to heaven, with no regard to the person’s moral state or his past actions?
On the other hand, you can find much evidence that Hitler turned his back on Christianity (e.g., “Christianity is an invention of sick brains.” “The best thing is to let Christianity die a natural death.”)
A few comments:
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This is probably a good place to flag the classic distinction between Judaism as a religious faith and “Jewry” (a term with highly negative connotations since the Nazis, but useful in this regard as a distinguisher) as an ethnic group. Some religious Jews are converts to that belief structure; many ethnic Jews are atheists, agnostics, or members of another faith. And of course there are what we’d term “denominational differences” if speaking of Christianity between the Orthodox, Conservatives, and Reform branches of Judaism.
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My impression of Judaism is that it is far more centered on one’s relationship to G-d on Earth in this mortal life than in what may happen in the afterlife – something I am warmly sympathetic too personally.
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CurtC is right in one way: “the vast majority of Christian sects” are various Protestant denominations, with memberships from a few thousand on up. There is one (barely, since 2003) surviving Nestorian church, six Oriental Orthodox, about 20 national Eastern Orthodox churches, 21 national “churches” in a dozen or so “rites” affiliated with Catholicism, and perhaps ten Old Catholic national churches – all of which are united in one belief structure per grouping but with individual-nation autocephaly except in Catholicism. Any halfway comprehensive listing of Baptist or Methodist/Wesleyan denominational churches would far exceed any of those numbers, and each has “denominational distinctives” in their beliefs, though sometimes very minor and abstruse to a third-party viewer.
Finally, any honest reporting of theology in Catholicism and evangelical Protestantism would take into account a highly complex and nuanced system of beliefs not easily reducible to the generalizations stated here: each believes that there is some act which is itself salvific which occurs in people’s lives, but each believes that behavior thereafter, wilful choice to sin, the Holy Spirit working through the conscience, God’s justice and His mercy, all work together to produce results we cannot judge in the life of each individual. I’ve in the past used the metaphor that Purgatory in Catholic thought is “Heaven’s mud room” – a usage familiar to most people who have visited working family farms. In short, it’s a place where, invited into the home, you can clean yourself up of the muck and mire that have stuck to you while “outside” before coming in.
The only thing I would add to the excellent thread is to point out how long this split has been in Judaism (and, perhaps, where the idea that “Jews don’t believe in immortality” might come from)
But the doctrine of the Sadducees is this: That souls die with the bodies; nor do they regard the observation of any thing besides what the law enjoins them; for they think it an instance of virtue to dispute with those teachers of philosophy whom they frequent: but this doctrine is received but by a few, yet by those still of the greatest dignity. But they are able to do almost nothing of themselves; for when they become magistrates, as they are unwillingly and by force sometimes obliged to be, they addict themselves to the notions of the Pharisees, because the multitude would not otherwise bear them.
Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Chapter 1.4
In the same part Josephus notes that Pahrisees, Essenses and Zealots all believed in immortality and so does “the multitude”
Tomndeb, my knowledge of the Catholic Church was gained through eight 8 years of RC elemntary school in which we studied the Baltimore Cathecism until it was coming out of our ears, four years of RC high school taught by priests, and one year in an RC University (before it went secular to qualify for funding from the government). Once they got the money they kept teaching Thomistic Philosophy which was nothing more than a religion course in disguise.
Everything I ever saw and read, and everything I was told by confessors and spiritual advisors made it VERY clear that masturbation is a mortal sin. Furthermore, since I am a gay person who has been living with my spouse for 30 years (and we got legally married last year) I have committed the mortal sin of sodomy an estimated 2000-3000 times in my life. What is it that the present Pope said about that when he was head of the former Inquisition? “Grave moral disorder” and “intrinsic moral evil” c ome to mind. Since I do not for one second repenta single one of those acts, I am obviously barbecue matrialk in the eyes of Ratzinger and his outfit.
Your desire to see the Catholic Church as benevolent and oh-so liberal is comendable, but somewhat naive.
The “gravity” so to speak is nothing to you (no value judgement by me), so why would/should YOU
consider it a mortal sin? I guess for jerking off it’s the old “Sperm is Sacred Sperm is Good”
thing…
I was educated by members of the Oblate and Jesuit orders, as well as by nuns of the Holy Cross. AT NO POINT in the course of some 14 years of Catholic education, including University-level courses, was I ever told that it was up to ME to determine the gravity of a mortal sin, nor was I ever told, at any time, that it would not be a mortal sin unless I considered it “grave”.
You will excuse me if I do not remember the specific names of each priest, spiritual advisor and confessor I had forty or 50 years ago.
However, I do remember for a fact that an Oblate priest preaching a retreat to our Roman Catholic High School Class, a gent by the name of Halley, specifically told us in 1964 (I believe it was November) that he had once been called to the scene of an accident where a couple of teenagers who had been having pre-marital sex in the back of a car were suddenly killed when a truck struck the car, killing them instantly.
The priest told us how distressed he was knowing that they had both died in a state of “MORTAL SIN” and that their souls were both in Hell at that moment.
This person was a priest hired to preach retreats with the full approval and permission of his Bishop. Do you suppose he was heretical and nobody knew it?
In addition, I would number at 20 to 30 the number of Catholic Priests who told me in confession or spiritual talks that mastubation was a mortal sin between 1960 and the day I walked out of the RC Church in 1966, at the age of 18. As to homosexuality, I certainly never discussed it with any of them, including one priest who sexually assaulted me.
Do you suppose all of these people were asleep of away from class in the seminary when the “true nature” of a mortal sin as described by Tomndeb was explained?
Your desire to paint the RCC in the most glaring shades of meanness in despite of the facts is otherwise than naive.
I don’t doubt that you may have been taught that masturbation was a mortal sin–particularly over thirty years ago in a high school setting. In that same school, however, (particularly if you were reading the Baltimore Catechism*) you should have been given a better description of what the church views as necessary requirements to commit a mortal sin.
I suspect that I agree with some of your criticisms (either of doctrine or of pedagogy) of the RCC. I have no problem with you voicing distaste for your memories of your experience. I have never claimed that the RCC is all sweetness and light (or even that it is free of errors, as you would know if you have read any of my various posts on the history of the church), however, when posting here, we should attempt to post actual facts, not feelings engendered a generation back. If you wish to condemn the RCC positions on homosexuality, abortion, marriage, salvation, or any number of issues, go ahead–as long as you get your facts straight. Express all the bad feelings regarding the RCC you wish (particularly in the Fora that support those expressions), but when you post errors of fact in GQ, I’m going to call you on it.
- From the BCC #1, the one aimed at the youngest kids:
37. What three things are necessary to make a sin mortal?
To make a sin mortal these things are necessary:
*first*, the thought, desire, word, action, or
omission must be seriously wrong;
*second*, the sinner must know it is seriously wrong;
*third*, the sinner must fully consent to it.
By the time you get to BCC #3 in high school, they should have been providing substantially more nuance. Unfortunately, there was a certain Jansenist hangover that permeated many schools into the early 1970s, making much more of some sins than Church Doctrine could actually support. Note that I did not claim that you were deliberately spreading falsehoods; I simply expressed the wish that you had had better teachers.
And, also, for comparison, here’s this (bolding mine)
So if a priest in the present Catholic Church openly preaches that there is nothing wrong with two gay men living together in a conjugal relationship, which includes a sexual expression of that relationship, then he will not be spoken to by his bishop?
By the way, what if the priest who assualted me when I was 14 did not consider his act immoral (what he actually did was play with my privates and fellate me. I assume that was not a mortalo sin if the good father did not cosider it so?
What if he had decided to hang me up and eviscerate me, without considering that a grave act? Would he still not be committing a mortal sin?
Why does the Pope consider homosexual acts to be “an intrinsic moral evil” if it depends of the relative gravity I ascribe to it?
Why does the RC Chgurch presently fight throughout the western world to prevent any form of gay civil marriage, or even civil unions or even recognition of gay rights? It seems to me there is a great deal more absolutism in the RC Church than you are willing to admit, Tomndeb.
I’d note that what the Catholic Church officially teaches and what individuals, including religious and ordained, claim that it teaches, is sometimes quite a strong distinction. I know some of the things my Catholic schoolmates quoted Fr. Labrosse and the Sisters of St. Joseph (most of whom appeared to be old enough to us kids for the designation to be literal! :D) as having taught them, and much of what they had to say does not appear in the CCC at all. And I’ve been told explicitly by self-styled Catholic “experts” that Anglican orders are ex cathedra and infallibly declared always invalid – despite a far more nuanced view that appears to be direct from the appropriate Vatican Congregation, taking into account PNCC and Old Catholic participation in episcopal consecrations, the near-parallelism of the Ordinals today, etc. So Valteron may well be telling the exact, precise truth – but his teachers have put much the wrong focus on things. (I’d be extraordinarily surprised to find anything official declaring premarital sex always a mortal sin, and have a hunch that was Fr. Halley’s way of putting a bit of fear of sexual sin into a bunch of presumably-horny teenage boys. (Amusingly, I typed “teenage goys” at first, which kind of brings the discussion back to Judaism! :D)
What about when the person performing the act feels it is not wrong AT ALL and wishes that a rich, powerful and reactionary organization of anti-sexual celibate old men would stop trying to roll back his civil rights?
You find the verbal and emotional terrorizing of teenaged boys who are forced to attend a retreat to be funny, Polycarp? Strange, but I fail to see the humour there.
When it comes to this stuff, I am really happy I signed up with the Chosen People. 
So, I went to a Catholic high school.
There was a statue of Jesus in the middle of the stairway, where it turned.
Someone took a cigarette, tore off the filter and rolled the ends up like a joint.
They stuck it in Jesus’ hand, the one one with two fingers held up like he was giving the peace sign.
Is that venial or mortal?
No. A priest currently preaching that homosexuality is fine is going to get hauled in and yelled at. If you want to condemn the RCC for its position on homosexuality, go ahead (as long as you don’t misrepresent what it actually says).
As to the priest who assaulted you, he definitely knew it was wrong unless he was mentally ill. I would have no interest in defending him or his actions.
I initially responded to a specific claim that you made regarding the RCC’s current teachings. I would not be surprised if you were taught badly, but I see no reason to allow the errors (even if they originated among poorly trained teachers) to stand on the SDMB without correction.
If you sincerely believe the act isn’t wrong, then your action isn’t a mortal sin, under the rules of the Catholic church. The Catholic church teaches that sin is an act of the will…a conscious desire to do wrong, so therefore, if a person is ignorant of the evil of his actions, then he doesn’t sin.
This is the same reason that, even at the time of the Baltimore Catechism, it could say:
because of its belief that anyone, even if they’re ignorant of the truth, who loves God and tries to do the will of God, is a servant of God, and part of the church, and also
I have a photo of a similar statue in nearly the identical pose that I took while in the stairway at a seminary while on retreat. (It was not identical; the statue was also wearing a fringed leather jacket.) I was pretty sure, at the time, that there was no sin involved.
Thanks. I’ve worried about my unknown classmate’s immortal soul for some time!