Piracy

[Croat]

Hello, I come from Croatia and I have a question about pirated software?

Is it a grave matter to download pirated software for personal use. I am aware of the 3 conditions that must be met for a sin to be mortal.

We have law in our country that "de jure" forbids pirated software but "de facto" authorities are not enforcing this law on citizens who use programs for personal non-commercial activities. Piracy is not classical theft because we are not depriving owners of its original product but i think that they are still hurt by piracy in general. I dont know if I personaly am damaging seriously the owner by non-commercial use. I talked with two priests about it and they said that it is not a grave matter. Our legal system is not very refined. One example is that even our goverment "de facto" tolerates tax evasion to some extent.

What do you say about this topic? Is it moraly the same to use pirated software in US and in Croatia?

Can it be for me a grave matter?

[Jaime]

Grave matter is based on the 10 commandments.

[quote]858 Grave matter is specified by the Ten Commandments, corresponding to the answer of Jesus to the rich young man: "Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, [b]Do not steal[/b], Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and your mother."[font="Verdana"][size="2"][sup][url="http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P6C.HTM#$21N"]132[/url][/sup][/size][/font] The gravity of sins is more or less great: murder is graver than theft. One must also take into account who is wronged: violence against parents is in itself graver than violence against a stranger.[/quote]

Stealing is clearly grave matter. Apparently you are of the mind that piracy is not theft. I know there are others that would definitely say that piracy is theft. I think the rest of that debate should be resolved by you and your confessor. The only suggestion that I can make is this. If a moral decision is in a grey area, you might want to err on the safest side. Here's an example

I go through check out line and realize that the cashier accidentally undercharged me by a dollar for the cheese that I bought. Instead of debating in my head whether or not this constitutes stealing on my part because I saw him make the mistake, to err on the safest side, I would let him know and let him make the decision to correct his error or not. This frees me from ever having to ask someone if I've done something wrong. Makes it simple.