Catholic Question

[ProScribe]

Is using tobacco a mortal sin?
. . .

 

[Metanoia02]

no

 

[Metanoia02]

double post

 

[krstlros]

Why would you think tobacco is a mortal sin?

 

[JacktheCatholic]

Is using tobacco a mortal sin?
. . .

Tobacco is used for nicotine which is a drug that has been proven to have harmful effects. The Catechism has this to say on DRUGs:

2291

The use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on human health and life. Their use, except on strictly therapeutic grounds, is a grave offense. Clandestine production of and trafficking in drugs are scandalous practices. They constitute direct co-operation in evil, since they encourage people to practices gravely contrary to the moral law.

http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt3sect2chpt2art5.htm



* Please correct me if I am mistaken.

 

[MikeK]

Perhaps using tobacco for the first time might be a mortal sin under some circumstances. Most smokers are addicted to the stuff, and addixcts do not generally posess full freedom, so no, one who uses tobacco is not usually in a state of mortal sin because of such in my estimation.

Jack, you nimrod, do you really think that the Catechism is talking about nicotine when it references the "use of drugs"? How about caffiene? Is the little old lady who enjoys a cup of slightly cafinated tea each morning in a state of mortal sin?

 

[ShannonMcCatholic]

WHen it comes to tobacco- temperance is the key. Can you be someone who smoke a cigar on the weekend, or one cigarette after dinner, or smokes hookah with your friends on Saturday night? Well then it's not sinful...the problem however is that tobacco is wicked addictive, and most people will not be able to use tobacco temperately. Then it becomes sinful--however once something is an addicition, one's freedom is diminished and precludes it, likely, from being a mortal sin. I don't know where the threshold is...but I'd guess that if you smoke more than a cigarette or two a day you are no longer in the zone of temperate usage.

 

[ZooMom]

Is using tobacco a mortal sin?
. . .

No. The sin comes in when people forget *moderation*. Excessive use of anything...ANYTHING...can be a sin, though. Culpability varies.

 

[ZooMom]

Yeah...what Shannon said.

 

[Metanoia02]

Tobacco is used for nicotine which is a drug that has been proven to have harmful effects. The Catechism has this to say on DRUGs:

2291

The use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on human health and life. Their use, except on strictly therapeutic grounds, is a grave offense. Clandestine production of and trafficking in drugs are scandalous practices. They constitute direct co-operation in evil, since they encourage people to practices gravely contrary to the moral law.

http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt3sect2chpt2art5.htm



* Please correct me if I am mistaken.

Nicotine is not a drug. There are no real thereputic uses for it outside of assisting with helping to withdraw from dependency.

 

[ShannonMcCatholic]

I dunno, Met....is heroin a drug?

 

[JacktheCatholic]

Nicotine is not a drug. There are no real thereputic uses for it outside of assisting with helping to withdraw from dependency.

Thanks. So I checked out 'good ole' Wiki and this is what it says:

Toxicology
The LD50 of nicotine is 50 mg/kg for rats and 3 mg/kg for mice. 40–60 mg (0.5-1.0 mg/kg) can be a lethal dosage for adult humans.[17] [18] This designates nicotine as an extremely deadly poison. It is more toxic than many other alkaloids such as cocaine, which has an LD50 of 95.1 mg/kg when administered to mice. Spilling liquid nicotine on human skin could result in death.[19]
The carcinogenic properties of nicotine in standalone form, separate from tobacco smoke, have not been evaluated by the IARC, and it has not been assigned to an official carcinogen group. The currently available literature indicates that nicotine, on its own, does not promote the development of cancer in healthy tissue and has no mutagenic properties. Its teratogenic properties have not yet been adequately researched, and while the likelihood of birth defects caused by nicotine is believed to be very small or nonexistent, nicotine replacement product manufacturers recommend consultation with a physician before using a nicotine patch or nicotine gum while pregnant or nursing. However, nicotine and the increased cholinergic activity it causes have been shown to impede apoptosis[citation needed], which is one of the methods by which the body destroys unwanted cells (programmed cell death). Since apoptosis helps to remove mutated or damaged cells that may eventually become cancerous, the inhibitory actions of nicotine may create a more favourable environment for cancer to develop, though this also remains to be proven.
At least one study has concluded that exposure to nicotine alone, not simply as a component of cigarette smoke, could be responsible for some of the neuropathological changes observed in infants dying from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).[20]
It has been noted that the majority of people diagnosed with schizophrenia smoke tobacco. Estimates for the number of schizophrenics that smoke range from 75% to 90%. It was recently argued that the increased level of smoking in schizophrenia may be due to a desire to self-medicate with nicotine. [21] [22] More recent research has found the reverse, that it is a risk factor without long-term benefit, used only for its short term effects.[23] However, research on nicotine as administered through a patch or gum is ongoing.

Nicotine and oxidative stress

Nicotine is detoxified by the cytochrome p450 in the liver. Recently it has been published that it produces free radicals in this reaction.[citation needed]



Link to circulatory disease

Nicotine has very powerful effects on arteries throughout the body. Nicotine is a stimulant, speeding up the heart by about 20 beats per minute with every cigarette; it raises blood pressure, and is a vasoconstrictor, making it harder for the heart to pump through the constricted arteries. It causes the body to release its stores of fat and cholesterol into the blood.
Nicotine increases the risk of blood clots significantly.[citation needed] If blood clots in an artery, blood flow is reduced or halted, and tissue loses its source of oxygen and nutrients and dies in minutes.
Peripheral circulation, arteries going to the extremities, are also highly susceptible to the vasoconstrictor effects of nicotine as well as the increased risk of clots and clogging.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine



* Sounds like a drug.

 

[ProScribe]

Why would you think tobacco is a mortal sin?

I don't know. My conscience is working overtime.

 

[MikeK]

The eye-patch wearing pirate nun on EWTN (sister Mary what's-her-face)once said that smoking was absolutely not a mortal sin on her show. She even laughed at the person who suggested that it was. I trust her over you, Jack. She's awesome. Pirate Nuns rule.

 

[JacktheCatholic]

On a side note and related to the Catechism saying drugs inflict grave damage...

QUOTE:

Overall Mortality

• Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States. Cigarette smoking causes an estimated 438,000 deaths, or about 1 of every 5 deaths, each year. This estimate includes approximately 38,000 deaths from secondhand smoke exposure.
• Cigarette smoking kills an estimated 259,500 men and 178,000 women in the United States each year.
• More deaths are caused each year by tobacco use than by all deaths from human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), illegal drug use, alcohol use, motor vehicle injuries, suicides, and murders combined.
• On average, adults who smoke cigarettes die 14 years earlier than nonsmokers.
• Based on current cigarette smoking patterns, an estimated 25 million Americans who are alive today will die prematurely from smoking-related illnesses, including 5 million people younger than 18.

http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/Factsheets/tobacco_related_mortality.htm

 

[JacktheCatholic]

The eye-patch wearing pirate nun on EWTN (sister Mary what's-her-face)once said that smoking was absolutely not a mortal sin on her show. She even laughed at the person who suggested that it was. I trust her over you, Jack. She's awesome. Pirate Nuns rule.

I am only posting information I have found in the Catechism and online. No need to be like that. Besides who said I am asking anyone to trust me? I am merely presenting facts for your review. You disagree with those facts?

 

[D'Ann]

I use to smoke cigarettes. With God's grace and help, I stopped smoking about 4 years ago.

I think it might be a sin, but I don't know. I think what Shannon said makes a lot of sense. I also think it depends on how culpable the person is.

 

[D'Ann]

The reason that I quit smoking was because I did feel convicted by the Holy Spirit because the cigs were damaging my body. If the Holy Spirit is convicting you of smoking... pray and ask God to help you and give you the will power to overcome the desire and addiction. You can also try patches and nicotine gum to help you through the tough withdrawals at first.

 

[Ave Maria]

I noticed that no one quoted this relevant passage from the Catechism:

2290 The virtue of temperance disposes us to avoid every kind of excess: the abuse of food, alcohol, tobacco, or medicine. Those incur grave guilt who, by drunkenness or a love of speed, endanger their own and others' safety on the road, at sea, or in the air.

 

[Metanoia02]

I dunno, Met....is heroin a drug?

Certainly, opium and its derivitives have been used for thereputic uses for centuries. Cocaine as well. We could debate Marijuana, since most of its thereputic effects have been after the fact so to speak.