Expert: Griff Ruby - 1/14/2006

Question
Hi, how big of a sin is it to tell someone that you had sex, but in reality I did not have sex.

I told someone I had sex, I felt like part of hte group, but I am still a virgin and will be one until I get married, but I told someone I had sex already, because I just wanted to fit in and not be bothered and be part of it.

was that a really bad Mortal sin to pretend I had sex, when I really did not?

Answer
Obviously, if you have retained you virginity, your sin is not one against the virtue of chastity, but scandal.  Many associate scandal with giving offense or shocking people, but as it is, only those few who are still upright in their morals can get shocked by other's admitting to such sins.  The sin of scandal goes a lot further than that.  Even if everyone who hears you lay claim to having so sinned thinks that is great, what you have done is give credence to their upside-down "morality," one in which virginity is seen as "bad," and the loss of it, something to be proud of.
It is a sad commentary on the quality of people you have decided to surround yourself with, and it is only a matter of time before they will require of you some manner of "proof" that will require you to do what you have up to this point merely pretended to.  The worst part is that you had a chance to "stand up to be counted," to change the whole tone of the company you keep, and instead you bowed to their "god" of sinning.
Suppose instead you had said, "That's none of your business!" or even "I'm a virgin and I'm proud of it, in fact I like being a virgin!"  Would the "face" you might lose with some of them really matter so much?  Indeed there might have been some others in the group sitting on the fence, perhaps even lying about it as you did, who now only feel all the more "left behind" by you and the others.
Oftentimes, the loudest and most braggart of those who talk about such things, for example, in the locker room, tend to be those who have done little anyway.  As the saying goes, "the talkers don't do, and the doers don't talk."  All it feeds is an ugly pride in claiming to have done (and especially in fooling others into thinking you have done, so as to admire you) something that can only be described as a betrayal of God, of whatever person you may one day marry, and of course anyone in your group relaying any actual event is betraying the one they did it with, and if they are lying they damage the reputation of the one they name as the one they did it with.
Most of us have a desire to do what is right, and when others are bold to speak what is right that emboldens us to speak up for what is right as well, and provides encouragement in what is at times a more difficult path.  One thing one finds out over time in life is that keeping one's virginity is hard, and losing it is easy.  But keeping it becomes only all the harder without the support of others who also see the value of it.  There were probably others in the group who lied about it just like you, and finding no more strength in you than they found in themselves, it won't be hard for them to decide to "join the group" actually by going ahead and losing it.  And that is where the sin of scandal finds its wickedness, for it discourages good and encourages evil.  It "teaches" evil, and it is only a matter of time before everyone gets the lesson.  And someday, when you really do find yourself tempted where will you turn for someone to shake you by the shoulders and remind you that you know better than to do it?
So where to go from here?  Point one, confess the sin to the priest and obtain absolution for it.  Point two, resolve that should this ever come up again you are not going to lie about it.  "None of your business" and "I'm proud of being a virgin" are both perfectly legitimate responses should the question come up again.  As for this group who would ask such a thing and be pleased by such an answer, I think they show themselves to be bad persons to hang about with, in all likelyhood getting you in other sorts of trouble.  And I think it is a bit late to be much of a good influence on them now.  Even if you tell them you lied and what the truth is, you will seem to them as somebody who has reversed themselves and with little or no credebility.  At most and at best you might by doing that sniff out what others might have lied just like you did.  Perhaps you can start a new group of friends based on stronger and better principles.  In any case it will take some time (if it is at all possible) to prove to them that you will not be pushed around any longer by them.  Make new and different friends and get a good solid friendship going with them first and after than go back to see who among your former friends might either have been lying as you did, or else having second thoughts about having thrown away what one never really quite fully recovers.  For what someone can now think of as fun or whatever may grow old and stale with time, and some do truly repent, practicing a virginal lifestyle from this point on, which some regard as a kind of "second virginity."
I wrote most of that not knowing whether I was addressing a guy or a girl, but as I come across the fact that your name is John, on other detail occurs to me, a practical way to get out of this corner you are in quite diplomatically.  I think "none of your business; I don't talk about that anymore" would be the stronger way to go, especially if you must continue with these other guys  (e. g. if all of you are part of a football team, or the like).
By suddenly no longer talking about it, I think it would not take long for the rest to realize you were just bragging and not really doing it with anybody at all, but that won't really much matter to them.  I think you would then regain their respect as some will wonder if now you have actually started "doing it" with someone real, and they will begin trying to pry it out of you.  The more you deny it the more they won't believe your denials, but whose fault is that?  You're simply telling the truth, and hopefully, eventually, that too will sink in, especially as all attempts on their part to find out "who she is" fail.  By the time they finally figure out that you really are telling the truth the bragging will be long forgotten and instead what they will realize is that what has happened is that you have grown up and started acting like a real man.