Venial Sin

It is so easy to slip into the way of thinking that venial sin isn't that bad. True, it is not mortal sin, but it still is quite destructive and will erode our union with God in that "drip of water on rock" way.

Our Lord has called us to holiness for us to love with deeds. And on the approach we adopt towards deliberate venial sin will depend the progress we make in our interior life. For when we do not struggle to avoid venial sins or when there is not enough contrition for them, they damage the soul grievously. These venial sins make the soul insensitive to the inspirations and motions of the Holy Spirit. They weaken the life of grace and make the virtues more difficult to practice, and incline one towards mortal sin.

Many pious souls, says a present-day author [B. Baur, In Silence with God], are in an unfaithful state almost continuously as regards "little things;" they are impatient, hardly charitable in their thoughts, judgments and words, false in their conversations and attitudes, slow and lax in their piety; they don't control themselves and are excessively frivolous in their language, or treat the good name of their neighbor lightly. They know their own defects and infidelities, and perhaps even accuse themselves in confession; but they do not seriously repent of them, nor do they make use of the means to avoid them in the future. They do not realize that each one of these "imperfections" is like a leaden weight that drags them down. They do not realize that they are beginning to think in a purely human way and to work only for human reasons, or that they habitually resist the inspirations of grace and misuse them. The soul thus loses the splendor of its true beauty, and God is increasingly distanced from it. Little by little the soul loses contact with God: in him it does not see a loving and lovable Father to whom it should give itself with filial affection; something has been allowed to place itself between the two. This is the beginning of the road to lukewarmness.

Lent and Eastertide (In Conversation with God, Vol. 2)