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TopI said that I would be writing as a Catholic priest, and that is especially important to remember for this part. I can guarantee that many other religious groups (and a lot of Catholics!) would disagree with what I am going to say. This is a very short description of some basic issues that may be helpful. I’m sure other aspects will come up later.
First, the idea of sin. English has only one word that really fits for 3 very different ideas that are found in the Bible. Having only one word for it has led to a lot of unnecessary confusion.
"Sin" can refer to the human condition of being imperfect, living in an imperfect world, living among other people. We live in a world that has sickness, and suffering, and not enough love. When people talk about "Original Sin" that is a large part of what is being referred to. A child is born into a world that will have an impact on his life, and that is the "basic flaw" of being human. We are "out of tune" with God, with the beauty of nature, with love. We are challenged to work to transform that. I am not personally "to blame" for the world being the way it is, even though I am called to make it different. Perhaps in language that I’ve heard around Rainbow House: "You aren’t personally responsible for everyone in Ethiopia."
"Sin" can also refer to "missing the mark." At an archery contest, someone can try as hard as possible to hit the center of the target. Depending on natural talent, strength, the amount of practice, wind conditions, etc. the person may hit the very center or miss the entire target. The farther the target, the harder it gets. At some point, no human being will ever be able to hit the center. Sometimes, someone will be a champion archer but sneeze just as the shot is made. The string of the bow may break. He may simply get tired. Again, the challenge is to try to do the best we can, but none of us can be in every archery contest, and we can’t always do well. The challenge is to do a fair job of living life, recognizing that we will "miss the mark" often. We should still give ourselves credit for when we do well.
Third, "sin" can mean personal sin, a choice to do what is wrong, to turn from God, from other people, and in a sense, from ourselves. It is in this third sense that personal responsibility truly rests.
At least in Catholic theology, a number of things are necessary for a particular action to be a personal sin.
First, the act must objectively be "wrong" and work against that which is good. We don’t depend on our own understanding, but accept the help of other people, the Bible, the community to figure out what is in fact wrong. It is not sin if it is not wrong, and there must be good evidence that it is in fact wrong. For example, a parent may teach that the fork always goes on the right side of the plate. Fine. if a child puts the fork on top of the plate, the parent may not see it as correct, but it is not morally "wrong" as an action. Sometimes people get carried away and start labeling all kinds of things as "wrong" but that doesn’t mean they are. Common sense helps out a lot in this process.
Second, the person must know the act is wrong. There are some things that can be figured out pretty clearly on our own, but for most things someone has to explain why something is right or wrong.
Third, the person must freely choose to do that wrong act, knowing that it is wrong. Any lack of freedom may lessen the amount of responsibility or even remove it completely. Outside force, coercion, lessened ability to figure things out—whatever takes away freedom lessens responsibility. If I punched someone in the nose (an act I know is wrong) in my sleep, or coming out of anesthesia after surgery, or under threat, personal responsibility is reduced or not there at all.
What I’d like to point out is that all three must be present for anything to be a personal sin.
Next, there is a range of the seriousness of actions, and in Catholic theology they have been called "venial" or "mortal" sins. Now, both should be avoided and neither is good. However, venial sins are those that are simply not serious enough to ever be capable of breaking the bond between a person and God. They aren’t spiritually healthy, and are destructive, but they simply lack the capacity of breaking that bond, no matter how many times they occur, no matter how freely the person chooses them.
"Mortal" sins, on the other hand, are seen as having that possibility. They are morally wrong, and when the person knows they are wrong and freely chooses to do them, there is the possibility of breaking the bond with God. They are considered "major league" because of that possibility. That does not mean that any time one occurs that the bond of life is broken. Some, by their nature, only have that potential over a long period of time. Some do have the potential even if done once. Some have their main impact not on the bond with God but the bond with the Christian community of faith. The point is that there is a range in the seriousness.
Mortal sins are taken so seriously because it doesn’t seem like such a great idea to take chances with the relationship of faith, it’s just too important. The Church has erred in being so cautious that a lot of people have ended up being petrified over anything in that category, leading to a problem called a scrupulous conscience, where everything is seen as being suspect, and the person lives in unreasonable fear. That is as damaging as not taking the issues seriously enough.
From the pulpit, the three types of "sin" are often freely mixed together and encouragement to live a strong moral life can end up encouraging a continuing sense of guilt and uncertainty. Rather than viewing the relationship of life with God as a strong, steel cable that helps us in our challenge of creating a world of respect, justice, peace, and love, people sometimes view it like a thin string—"One false step and Zap, it’s all over." A sense of balance and proportion would help a lot here.
No human being, in the sense of personal sin, can ever say to another "You have sinned." They can say, "I think you have done what is wrong" but that is all. Only the person and God have the right to go further. A person can say "I have sinned" meaning that the act was wrong, the person knew it, and freely chose it with enough freedom for it to have been a sin. I have a feeling that a fair percentage of time God would disagree with the person’s assessment.
The job of moral theology is to look at different issues in our complex world and help the process of figuring out more about what is right and wrong. Usually the principles involved are more important than the details of the individual act. For example, charging interest on a loan was considered at one time to be terribly wrong, and Catholics simply didn’t get involved. Eventually, it was felt that charging fair interest would help the community develop, make money more available when people needed it, etc. So, the act was reevaluated.
Sometimes things that can’t be justified at all in moral theology are ignored by almost everyone. For example, to undergo plastic surgery without a good, proportionate reason is considered an assault on the body God gave us. Simply reducing the wrinkles of aging to "look better" just doesn’t make it as a proportionate reason. When was the last time you heard someone mention that?
Some things have nothing morally important about them beyond the fact that they were a law intended to help honor another concern. For example, there was a law that Catholics couldn’t eat meat on Friday. Among other things, when it first started it was considered a commitment of the Church as a whole to charity. It was a way to get people to buy fish to help out Portugal, which had fish but just about nothing else. The reason for the law ended up being largely forgotten, and many considered it important "just because it is the law."
A lot of times, things that are not much more than customs or usual ways of doing things end up being taken very seriously, when in fact they are intended to protect some other value or understanding, and some other way of doing things would work just as well or better. For example, there was a custom of women wearing hats in church. At times, it was seen as an act of rebellion or disrespect not to wear a hat. If someone wanted to be disrespectful, there are a lot of other ways to accomplish that, and in fact that would be the issue, not the hat.
As a community composed of human beings, we do need to figure out ways of doing things, and they should be fair, have some sense of balance, and work reasonably well. However, we should avoid making them more important than the job they are intended to do.
Where was I?
This discussion can go in a lot of different directions. I mentioned that different Churches have different ways of talking about these issues, and clearly it’s much more complicated than I’ve outlined here (if not I spent a lot of unnecessary time in the seminary). I do hope that this outline helps the discussion process.
Related subjects for future discussion could be the idea of conscience, forgiveness and reconciliation, pastoral theology and the relationship to moral theology.
© Fr J Mahoney