In Catholic
theology, there are two categories of sin: “venial” and “mortal.” According to the Catechism of the Catholic
Church:
“Mortal sin destroys
charity in the heart of man by a grave violation of God's law; it turns man
away from God, who is his ultimate end and his beatitude, by preferring an
inferior good to him.” (CCC
#1855)
“For a sin to
be mortal, three conditions must together be met: ‘Mortal sin
is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full
knowledge and deliberate consent.’" (CCC #1857 – emphasis in original)
On the other
hand, they believe that venial sin is not as serious:
“One commits venial
sin when, in a less serious matter, he does not observe the standard
prescribed by the moral law, or when he disobeys the moral law in a grave
matter, but without full knowledge or without complete consent.” (CCC #1862 –
emphasis in original)
“Venial sin weakens
charity; it manifests a disordered affection for created goods; it impedes the
soul's progress in the exercise of the virtues and the practice of the moral
good; it merits temporal punishment. Deliberate and unrepented venial sin
disposes us little by little to commit mortal sin. However venial sin does not
break the covenant with God. With God's grace it is humanly reparable. ‘Venial
sin does not deprive the sinner of sanctifying grace, friendship with God,
charity, and consequently eternal happiness.’” (CCC #1863)
Notice the term
“humanly reparable.” I’ll come back to
that later.
Is All Sin the Same?
Since
Protestants don’t generally believe in the categories of “mortal” and “venial”
sins, many Catholics will therefore say that Protestants believe “all sin is
the same.”
But to clear the air, let me assure you that all sin is not equal. God is just and His punishment for stealing a
candy bar is not the same as it is for randomly killing someone. Yet, the person stealing the candy bar (if
unrepentant) will be in the same Lake of Fire as the person who murders (if unrepentant). God sends them both to Hell. They’ll just be eternally suffering on different levels.
All sin is indeed equal in terms of your final destination, but not in terms of
intensity of punishment. So, your “little”
(venial) sins are still incredibly serious and must be dealt with. People are often taught that a “little white
lie” is no big deal, but again, we should treat all sin with the same sense of
urgency.
The “seven deadly sins” that the Bible speaks
of (Proverbs
6:16-19) are not the only
ones that are deadly! All sin, if not
repented of, is mortal.
From
Whence Cometh This Doctrine?
So, where does
the Catholic Church get this idea of two categories of sin? Well, there is a footnote in CCC #1854 that
points to a Scripture passage that seems to be the pivotal reason that they
believe in venial and mortal sin:
If any man see his brother sin a
sin which is not unto
death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto
death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it. All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a
sin not unto death. (1 John 5:16-17)
Catholics claim that the apostle John is
saying here that some sins are not
deadly. But Scripture is clear that ALL
sin kills – EVERY sin makes you eligible for Hell:
For whosoever shall keep the whole
law, and yet offend in one point,
he is guilty of all. (James 2:10)
For as many as are of the works of
the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not
in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.
(Galatians 3:10 – Emphasis
added)
These two verses just above are saying that
the law is a package deal. If you break only one of His commandments, you are
guilty of breaking God’s law as a whole. If you are in court for breaking a law, the
judge will not let you go simply because you got most of them right. You are
still guilty of breaking the law of the land.
We must realize that God’s law is not just a random assortment of loose
principles and ideas, it should be taken very seriously because it is the
essence of His character and desire.
I believe that 1 John 5:16-17 above is
actually talking about the unpardonable
sin that Jesus spoke of in Matthew 12:31-32. The unpardonable sin is not just one
particular sin – it is the end result of a continual hardening process of a
person’s unrepentant heart over time. Every individual sin can be forgiven,
but Jesus is alluding to the fact that a person’s heart has reached a certain level
of coldness and hostility where there is no turning back. He is sinning against the Holy Spirit, the
member of the Trinity whose work it is to convict us of sin and to lead us to
repentance (John 16:8; Romans 2:4) – and this sin is a complete rejection,
a despising of that work of the Spirit.
Concerning blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, if someone
fears that he has crossed the line and is worried that he may have committed
this sin, the chances are very good that he hasn’t,
because the person who is guilty of this sin is not concerned about it and will
not want anything to do with God. He is
beyond help. It is the point of no return,
where grace is no longer available. That
is a terrifying place to be! I think
that this is the point in 1
John 5:16-17, it is not describing “mortal” versus “venial” sins. All sins are mortal (deadly) – until you
repent of them! None are mortal if they
are confessed and forgiven.
Error
in the Catechism
I want to point out a couple of things from
the Catechism quote that that I mentioned at the beginning of this article (CCC
#1863). First, it says:
“Deliberate and
unrepented venial sin disposes us little by little to commit mortal sin…”
I pretty much agree with this statement in the
sense that your “little” sins, if unconfessed and the person remains
unrepentant, can lead to a hardening of the heart, and ultimately destroy you. So, this just proves our point that “venial”
sins are also dangerous and can lead
to eternal damnation. So, there is no
separate category. Every sin is a “grave matter.”
The second point of the Catechism quote that I
want to address is this:
“With God's grace it
[venial sin] is humanly reparable.”
This suggests some sort of “restitution”
that the sinner is able to pay. In the
Catholic scheme of things, forgiveness can be applied to the sinner only after
some sort of work is done (penance). But
there is absolutely no sin that is reparable by any mere human in
Christianity. The only “repairing”
needed has already been done by Jesus Christ on His cross. This is the absolute cure for the effects of
sin. John the baptist so eloquently said
about Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God who TAKES AWAY the sin of the world” (John
1:29). Jesus didn’t just cover our sins, as was done in the Old
Testament. He takes them away, past, present and even future sins (if we repent and confess them).
To gain salvation, all we can do
is surrender to Him and believe/trust in His suffering and work
on that cruel cross. That is the gospel
– that is the good news. We don’t have
to constantly worry if we have done enough.
There are no rituals or works of charity that can repair, improve, or restore our
broken relationship with God. Only the
cross and only through Jesus.
Martin
Luther
There is a story about Martin
Luther, the Protestant Reformer and former Catholic priest. As a Catholic, he became extremely aware of
his sin and was so tormented by it that as soon as he finished his confession
and came out of the Catholic confessional, he would remember another sin and immediately
rush back into the confessional to confess it.
Sometimes he would spend hours in
the confessional. This was torture for
both Luther and the priest! The priest, wearied by Luther’s obsession,
reportedly told him that if he wanted to confess a sin, go out and commit
something worthy of confession.
The Catholic Church had Luther
(and all its members) thinking that he must merit his salvation through works
of some kind or another. But this was sheer
torture for him. He seemed to never be
able to do enough. He rightly understood
God’s hatred of sin (while most people don’t), but he was utterly
helpless. His sins terrorized him daily,
but in the Catholic system there was no relief.
But one day he finally came to fully
understand the phrase, “… the just shall live by faith” (Romans
1:17), whereupon he finally achieved the peace of God – and it revolutionized the history of the
medieval church.
We have to commend Luther for his zeal and his
fear of God. This is good. But there is a balance – we also need God’s
peace to be able to live the Christian life.
The problem is that he was desperately trying to rid himself of sin
through a works-based salvation. Luther
misunderstood the power of God’s grace and the sufficiency of the work that Jesus did on the cross. We must remember Jesus’ last words, “It
is finished!” (John 19:30).
See these articles on Luther and his battle
with sin:
https://www.placefortruth.org/blog/justification-and-martin-luther
https://worldlysaints.wordpress.com/2017/01/04/martin-luther-his-confessions-and-battle-against-sin/
Also, the practice of confession to a priest
is not a biblical one. See these
articles:
https://answeringcatholicclaims.blogspot.com/2023/01/the-sacraments-of-catholic-church-part.html
https://answeringcatholicclaims.blogspot.com/2011/08/hi-jacking-of-john-2023.html
Conclusion
The question to ask is, “WHY is the sin in 1
John 5 a “sin not unto death,” and the other a “sin unto death”? The answer is simply because the first one is
FORGIVEN/FORGIVABLE and the second is NOT!
This erroneous Catholic concept of venial and mortal sins goes against
clear biblical teaching elsewhere that says, “The wages of sin is death”
(Romans 6:23), or “The soul that sins, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4),
or “He
which converteth the sinner… shall save a soul from death” (James 5:20),
or “And
you… who were dead in trespasses and sin…” (Ephesians 2:1). Therefore, any and all sin (apart
from a repentant heart) brings spiritual death.
Now,
this doesn’t mean that a Christian loses
and gains his salvation every time he
sins and repents, over and over. No, as
long as he maintains his trust in Christ and his attitude is one of continual
repentance, his sin is washed away. This
applies to even those secret sins of which he may be unaware (Psalm 90:8).
Biblical confession is not a ritualistic or
robotic procedure in which every single personal thought has to be remembered and
painstakingly processed into a system where we can infallibly identify every
single sin in our lives – and then “formally” confess them to a priest. No, remember the thief on the cross? He simply said from the heart, “…Lord,
remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom” (Luke 23:42). Jesus knew his heart and immediately forgave
him.
We must be careful when attempting
to categorize sins as venial or mortal, as people might tend to view some of
their sins as “minor” and be casual about them. These two distinctions have certainly caused
confusion in the body of Christ.
So let us take care to be biblical
with our view of sin. In the end, we
must have balance – a healthy fear of God, yet a firm peace in our hearts,
knowing the sufficiency of Jesus’ work.
