Excerpt; http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12575a.htm
At the Council of Florence, Bessarion argued against the existence of real purgatorial fire, and the Greeks were assured that the Roman Church had never issued any dogmatic decree on this subject. In the West the belief in the existence of real fire is common. Augustine in Ps. 37 n. 3, speaks of the pain which purgatorial fire causes as more severe than anything a man can suffer in this life, “gravior erit ignis quam quidquid potest homo pati in hac vita” (P. L., col. 397). Gregory the Great speaks of those who after this life “will expiate their faults by purgatorial flames,” and he adds “that the pain be more intolerable than any one can suffer in this life” (Ps. 3 poenit., n. 1). Following in the footsteps of Gregory, St. Thomas teaches (IV, dist. xxi, q. i, a.1) that besides the separation of the soul from the sight of God, there is the other punishment from fire. “Una poena damni, in quantum scilicet retardantur a divina visione; alia sensus secundum quod ab igne punientur”, and St. Bonaventure not only agrees with St. Thomas but adds (IV, dist. xx, p.1, a.1, q. ii) that this punishment by fire is more severe than any punishment which comes to men in this life; “Gravior est omni temporali poena. quam modo sustinet anima carni conjuncta”. How this fire affects the souls of the departed the Doctors do not know, and in such matters it is well to heed the warning of the Council of Trent when it commands the bishops “to exclude from their preaching difficult and subtle questions which tend not to edification’, and from the discussion of which there is no increase either in piety or devotion” (Sess. XXV, “De Purgatorio”).
In the end, I would not expect God to accept anything unclean into heaven. It is just another way for God to allow for us on earth to pray for our departed,and for our departed to repay the debt of sin to enter into heaven clean.
You do pray for the departed? Yes/No?
I wish you a Blessed Evening!
“You do pray for the departed? Yes/No?”
Everyday, StFA, everyday!
By the way, anything from the Pseudo Council of Florence will get you exactly nowhere with us Orthodox. The falsity of that ouncil and its “dogmas” were proven, for us, by the immediate rejection of them by the people of God.
“In the end, I would not expect God to accept anything unclean into heaven.”
We don’t see things that way at all, StFA, starting with “unclean” right through “into heaven”.