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October 18, 2007
> 9:53 PM
on pain of mortal sin If you're Catholic, you may have heard this term. I saw it again this week as I was reading something. I thought I might share some thoughts on how it struck me and on the concept of mortal sin itself. As I have been navigating my way back into the Catholic Church, I have run into a few things in the theological arena which have caused me no small degree of consternation. The whole idea in and around the notion of sin, venial and mortal, how it affects us in either small or great ways, temporally or eternally - this is a big one. I've been thinking a lot about it recently, trying to come to grips with what it seems like the Church teaches, has taught, will teach(?) on this issue. One thing I keep running into in all this thinking, all this realignment and pinpointing of my theological compass, is how much nuance there is even in what seem to be clearly stated teachings in the Catholic world. Now, something else I've been seeing, and this has done me no good whatever, is that there is a definite "wing" of the Church which would very likely consider my speaking in terms of "nuance" as a symptom of becoming an "unfaithful Catholic." Perhaps they are right. I'm not really sure. For the time being though, I don't think so. Let me go on with my reaction to hearing or reading the phrase, "on pain of mortal sin." I'll put it in a little context to help. The particular moral neighborhood in which I encountered this most recently probably helped get me to the point where I wanted to write about it. It concerned the Church's requirements of fasting and abstinence (or some form of "penance") for all the faithful on Fridays, whether any Friday or Fridays in Lent. That's what we're talking about - whether or not one may eat meat, or only one meal, or something other than that, on Fridays. We're not talking about murdering your child or your Mother or torturing someone for fun. We're talking about eating meat or not eating meat, or even of not choosing to do some other act of penance on any given Friday... on pain of mortal sin. So, what's being posited here is that if I treat Fridays as I do Thursdays or Mondays, the Life Essence of God the Holy Spirit will come ungrafted from my own spirit and will leave me, once again, Life-less, spiritually dead, a child of the devil, who's eternal "home" is then, Hell. No need to try and explain the way mortal sin is understood - I know. I know the qualifications, the pre-conditions. In this instance, my problem, among others, is the so-called gravity of this matter. How grave is this again? I'm thinking this is more about disobeying the Church authorities than about eating meat or something else. Another problem is an understanding that the Church (her authorities) has the ability to make a discipline "Diving Law" and to dictate when the Saving Grace of God departs a person's spirit-man. That's a very problematic concept for me. On top of that, even the idea that one single act of whatever level of gravity, even done inside the 3 qualifiers, has within itself the ontological power to tear one asunder from any connection with God, is a huge stretch. But I already know that I'm in the company of not a few big theological minds in the Catholic Church. It seems my problem is nothing new. Not long ago, and I guarantee it wasn't new then either, some Catholic theologians, Karl Rahner maybe chief among them, came up with some thoughts that came to be known as the fundamental option. This idea is very similar to something I was trying to describe in this blog post a while back. It moves away from the very strict, legal view of mortal sin as the commission of one act so grave that it removes one from the state of Grace - toward a more progressive way of thinking about sin and the human will. Obviously, I can't get into great detail in this setting about something this in-depth. Basically this concept talks about a person's interior "attitude" toward or away from God being their base or fundamental option or "choice" to be for or against the Life of God. One may well be doing sinful things, as we all do, but this does not define one's "option." Now, the late Pope, John Paul II, put out something against a certain direction this thought could go. I think - it seems to me to make sense - that this was more about making sure nobody was saying that acts of sin don't matter or that they aren't damaging to us. I certainly see the cause for concern and appreciate a response given to make sure that people aren't out here teaching that specific sinful actions aren't consequential or negatively effective in some way. I do believe that "inordinate" actions are damaging to our spiritual insides. They affect our inward attitude, eventually. Back to the fundamental option, it doesn't seem as if anyone was trying to say that nothing matters except for how we "feel" about God or anything like that. It seems that way to me because my own thinking about the same kind of thing is similar. It was and is about the nature of God, His Love and Mercy, how He deals with and relates to us - that He is not about technical sin rules which, when broken, are grounds for dismissal. Honestly, if it's about that, I'm out. That kind of thinking does no good thing for the character of God as Father, or frankly, as any kind of a "just Judge." The concern seems to be that notion of fundamental option is, in essence, logically concluded in that neighborhood of thought - that categorical or particular sinful actions don't matter. At least the way I'm thinking about it, and what I seem to have seen thus far, is in no danger of going there. The thing that troubles me in the document, and with the traditional concept of mortal sin in general, is that there seems to be an all or nothing thing going on there. Either look at it the old "legal" way (one grave act = loss of all Grace and Hell) or well, or nothing, you're teaching against Truth. There seems not to be tons of room to talk about sin inside a person "becoming" mortal. Well, I'm not sure. The language in that place looks that way, but it doesn't always seem that way. Is there room to believe and think this way? I hope so. I'll keep on moving as if there is, for now. I'll not be alone in the Catholic world - which doesn't, in itself, make me right, I know that, but well, there you go. I am what I am. I'm honestly thinking things out here. It could be that this may help someone else think about these things. I have to rest in this: God is Love. God is our Father. He loves us as His dear children. His desire for us is for our good and not for our destruction. And my deep, deep intuition, my spiritual sense as a father myself, a gift I have from God Himself, that my love for my children is such that I could never sever them from "my grace" because of one act. I realize that one cannot form a theology, perfectly, based on "deep intuition." I'm not trying to do that. But I won't try to fully ignore that intuition either. My insides are not unformed by the Truth, both Scriptural and that of Tradition. That could get complicated and we've gotten complicated enough in this, perhaps, my longest of all posts. Thanks for reading this far. You few strong and unfaint of heart. I will thank you in advance for steering away from polemical responses in the comment arena. Peace to all in this house. Related posts > Brokenness 1 - Brokenness 2 - Brokenness 3 - You're going straight... - Sin and eternal destiny technorati tags > sin, mortal sin, fundamental option, catholic theology, moral theology Labels: catholic, personal, theology 0 Comments:| permalink | e-mail me | 
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