The phrase "a state of sin" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used in religious or moral discussions to describe a condition where someone is believed to be living in sin or engaging in sinful behavior.
Example: "The sermon focused on the importance of repentance for those who find themselves in a state of sin."
Alternatives: "condition of sin" or "state of wrongdoing".
Still, they knew they were living in a state of sin.
Semen itself was a toxic glue, effectively damning both men and women to a state of sin, a neat one-two punch that rendered sex dirty by definition.
Justification, in Christian theology, either (1) the act by which God moves a willing person from the state of sin (injustice) to the state of grace (justice); (2) the change in a person's condition moving from a state of sin to a state of righteousness; or (3) especially in Protestantism, the act of acquittal whereby God gives contrite sinners the status of the righteous.
As soon as we read this first line, "I came to myself in a dark wood," and if you read a lot of traditional commentators, traditional commentators will tell you, oh well Dante is here in a state of sin, the dark wood is really the condition of spiritual — maybe despair.
In 1 Cor 11 30 Paul speaks of the consequences of abuses in the Corinthian community related to the celebration of the Lord's Supper; he has just warned the Corinthians against eating and drinking the Eucharist in an unworthy way, in a state of sin.
Catholics who divorce and remarry in civil ceremonies are considered by the Church to be still married to their first spouse and living in a state of sin.
Souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend to hell "immediately after death" the church's Catechism states.
The bad news is that if they put off repentance too long and die in a state of mortal sin they face "exclusion from Christ's kingdom and the eternal death of hell".
And this week the Vatican let it be known that he will abolish the limbus infantium, the destination for the souls of infants who die unbaptised, and so in a state of original sin.
He complemented this activity with his political treatises on divine and civil dominion (De dominio divino libri tres and Tractatus de civili dominio), in which he argued men exercised "dominion" (the word is used of possession and authority) straight from God and that if they were in a state of mortal sin, then their dominion was in appearance only.
Do not receive Christ while in a state of serious sin.
