Why I Am Catholic: For Purgatory, Thank Heavens (Ecumenical)

WhyIAmCatholic.bloogspot.com ^ | November 2010 | Frank Weathers

[Mad Dawg]

Well, give us a hint. I’d say “uncreated.” I am bold in my folly because I trust God to set me straight through His servants.

[Secret Agent Man]

you need to read all of chapter 3 of 2 Corinthians. The context of the piece is growing in the Lord (while alive) - sanctification, not about glorification. The person who lives with their focus on Jesus is what they are talking about, and how by doing this they are transformed from one level of glory to a higher level of glory, which is what the sanctification process (aka living our life as a Christian as best we can) does.

2 Corinthians 5:8 is validation enough that God completes our sanctification for us instantly when we die and our race is over: “We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.” The prior two verses 5:6-7 provide the context that validates this point of view.

[Kolokotronis]

“Well, give us a hint. I’d say “uncreated.”

Very Good; your early training, evincing, no doubt, a pre-Council of Whitby phronema, has stood you in good stead, MD! Don’t tell the Dominicans! The Inquisition, as we all know, could be anywhere and is always unexpected.

[Mad Dawg]

The way to handle the Inquisition is to make sure you are one of the Inquisitors. Why do you think I joined the family, uh, I mean, order?

[plain talk]

The STATE of purgatory answers the question -- nearly all of us, no matter how holy, are still unworthy at the time of our death to be in the presence of (note, just about being the presence of , nothing to do with our salvation which was already won by Christ) God

You are incorrect. Christ's salvation was sufficient. There is nothing we can do to purify ourselves - purgatory or otherwise. The only remedy is what Christ did on the cross. Purgatory is a theory invented by men. It may or may not exist. Only God knows. I have no problem with discussions like this but they are in a theoretical abstract realm and are not based on scripture.

[sigzero]

Are you kidding me? What a lame answer and a total logical fallacy. I could support any false doctrine I wanted using that logic. The Bible speaks nothing of purgatory because it was a money making deal for the Church and is totally un-biblical.

[Mad Dawg]

Ecumenical thread? Manners?

The doctrine of Purgatory was being developed long before any dope thought of trying to sell indulgences, BTW.

Aquinas wisely says that to use the Scripture in argument against, say, the Muslims, makes no sense because Muslims do not hold the Scripture to be authoritative.

Similarly, we find in Scripture grounds to trust the Sacred Tradition of the Church. Of course others don't. But those who don't will teach little and learn less if their response to an approach to Scripture different from theirs is just to scoff.

[Mad Dawg]

The wonderful thing about Blackberries is that though I was away from home, I was able to read both Chap 3 and chap 5 in my spare time. This is great technology.

Just running things up the flagpole here: The first thing is that your construction is certainly that of the Mr. Dix who wrote "Alleluia, Sing to Jesus." The relevant line is "changed from glory//Into glory// 'Til in heav'n we see thy face ..."

And if by "validate" you mean "are consistent with" then certainly both chapters are consistent with a view that the 'dynamic' stops with death. But they do not require it, since they are, under that construction, silent about what happens at the point of death or thereafter.

What we laughingly refer to as my "thought", is based as much on jokes as on anything else. And early in life I read the joke about the physics graduate student whose wife asked him how the week had gone. "It was fabulous!" he said, "Everything we learned last week is wrong!"

I see my life here with God as, among other things, every more complete and detailed information on what a bozo I am am, and an ever more refined and urgent sense of how wonderful God is and how wonderfully He meets my defects and needs. "Everything I learned last week is wrong!"

Now, I hold that heaven is perfect bliss, is "behold[ing His] face". We are creatures and will never see perfectly. But we can always see better than we did. Think of asymptotes.

Or take another image entirely. Maybe you don't drink beer. Please believe me when I say that after a day of sailing or a day of hard labor in the earth, NOTHING on EARTH can compare to that moment when the beer hits your parched throat! Trust me on this.

Of course, the next gulp is not so wonderful because your thirst already is somewhat quenched. But holy men and women have assured us through the ages that the closer one is to God, the more one desires to be even closer. That's why Psalm 63 is an important one for us Catholics, important for celebrations. We celebrate our thirst because we believe that the increase in thirst is an indication of its being slaked.

So, one metaphor I like to use for heaven is the infinite prolongation of that first gulp, an ever-increasing desire always and forever met with precisely the right gratification of that desire: each gulp more thirsted for than the last, and each thirst more perfectly satisfied.

And how could such ever increasing union with God NOT be accompanied with an ever increasing splendor? So I see "changed from glory into [greater] glory" proceeding forever and ever.

Your mileage may vary.

My alleged point is that while many see a great seam between purgatory and heaven, I do not. As a creature, I can always be improved, always be made more and more like Him who made me, and I will never be exactly and completely like. As I am happy to go to physical therapy because it is to restore the strength which I never should have lost, so I am happy to enter more fully into the stream of Grace which will make me ever more like Him who made me.

If I am corrupt and impure gold, I will leap happily into the refining fire, and thank Him who kindled it and blew it white hot for my good.

[Mad Dawg]

There is nothing we can do to purify ourselves - purgatory or otherwise.

I don't think anyone here disagrees with that. I could be wrong. But at least I believe that, however it comes to me, any purification at all that I may undergo is by the merits, grace, and love of Christ, certainly not by me. I cannot bootstrap myself into purity.

[coincheck]

1) Those who believed GOD and followed His laws went to Paradise, or Abrahams Bosom as Jesus said.

2) Those alive who have not heard of Jesus will be judged by what they were able to know of him from the things that are made on earth and in the heavens. Read Romans Ch. 1.
God and Jesus are able to keep those who are faithful to him, even if they have not directly heard of Jesus, which is actually very few today.

[coincheck]

I do not want to argue. Just saying that the Bible says nothing about a place called purgatory, it is definately not there. To take verses out of context and make a doctrine of it is wrong. This is a tradition in the CC. As is many of the things they believe, just traditions. The CC makes these traditions as authoratative as scripture just as the Pharisees in Jesus time did.

[Salvation]

You are aware that in three places the Bible says that not everything is written down, aren’t you.

Thus, we have the traditions — not as you interpret them, but the stories handed down from the apostles to the next bishops and so forth.

We aren’t talking about ceremonies, etc. here, but stories that were not written down in the Bible but were handed down person to person to person to person.

[Secret Agent Man]

Well I do appreciate the good conversation about this we’ve had through the thread.

I will agrere it’s hard for us right now to really know what it feels like to be in heaven, in God’s presence, to be made perfect and complete. I also think it’s probably silly to try to even talk about the finishing process in terms of time as we know it today, because those who are now “in eternity” are outside of time, as they are with God in Heaven.

But the bottom line for me, anyway, is that I know when I die, after I have run the race here, however far I get in this process of sanctification, God will complete the good work He began in me and I will be made perfect and holy by Him. As we Christians will be in His presence after death, I believe this change “glorification” - the completion of the sanctification process - happens right after a believer dies. I don’t believe it takes hundreds of years, or thousands of years, or years, or days, I believe it occurs at the moment of death. It’s not about “not having suffered enough for our sins before we died.” The maturing and refining process you talk about is what takes place as we live our lives. God doesn’t sit there and say “I have saved you, but you didn’t suffer enough for your sins before I ended your life, so now you will have to wait a period of time in purgatory before I can allow you into my presence.” It appears that this is what is behind the belief of purgatory. Just a little more discomfort before finally being let into your reward. God is not sadistic. He’s already paid the price for us, why make those who die in Christ suffer a little more? There is a point to suffering while still alive on earth, but for the believer, there would be none after they are physically dead.

[Cronos]

Well, all of the conclusions you made in your earlier post were quite incorrect and they were thankfully NOT what The Church teaches

In Christianity, "Salvation" means Salvation -- the general meaning of liberation from straitened circumstances or from other evils, and of a translation into a state of freedom and security. If you are in a state of purgatory, you ARE in a state of freedom and security because you ARE going to heaven, you're not going to hell. Purgatory is no more than washing your hands before entering the temple of God - metaphorically speaking

Christ's sacrifice paid for salvation. His shed blood is sufficient payment for us to enter into the presence of God. Remember the example of washing your hands before entering the Lord's presence -- THAT is the state of purgatory

Purgatory is a metaphysical "washing" of yourself before coming into the Lord's presence. There is no such thing of some further penance or payment.

Of Course, if you are "dirtier", you need more "washing" than if you are "cleaner", but the process is the same and the end point is the same -- entering into the Temple which ALL who reach the "washing" are going to.

Your link is again incorrect -- it's a link to the Ottawa sun and other MSM articles, which is akin to arguing about Barak O by referring to the NYTimes editorials

Catholicism teaches that Christ's sacrifice was sufficient, in fact super-sufficient for our salvation. He saved us, we cannot save ourselves. God's grace is what saves us. THAT is Church teaching

Furthermore your use of the word "time" is also incorrect as is the rest of your post because purgatory is not a time, not a place, it's a process, and in fact out of our sense of time and space. What it is, we don't know, but it is a "cleansing". Christ "cleansed" the theif next to him.

Instead of reading the Mainstream media and coming at a wrong conclusion of Christianity, it would be better for you to actually read the Bible and for details on the Church to read the Catechism.

This says

1030 All who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. (this ties in to 1027 This mystery of blessed communion with God and all who are in Christ is beyond all understanding and description. Scripture speaks of it in images: life, light, peace, wedding feast, wine of the kingdom, the Father's house, the heavenly Jerusalem, paradise: "no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him.")

1031 The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned.606 The Church formulated her doctrine of faith on Purgatory especially at the Councils of Florence and Trent. The tradition of the Church, by reference to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a cleansing fire:607

As for certain lesser faults, we must believe that, before the Final Judgment, there is a purifying fire. He who is truth says that whoever utters blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will be pardoned neither in this age nor in the age to come. From this sentence we understand that certain offenses can be forgiven in this age, but certain others in the age to come.608

This is all what the Early Christians believed in, as some of the earliest Christian writings outside the New Testament, like the Acts of Paul and Thecla and the Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicity (both written during the second century), refer to the Christian practice of praying for the dead. Such prayers would have been offered only if Christians believed in purgatory, even if they did not use that name for it.

[Cronos]

Thank you john. It's actually thanks to Alex and our other estranged brethern who bring up what they believe to be Church teachings (but which are incorrect) which has helped me.

If it wasn't for his bringing up these strange statements about what The Church believes, I would never investigate and see in detail what we REALLY believe in (which is quite opposite). Alex does The Church a great favor by making Catholics stronger in their faith and making us learn more about and getting stronger in our Catholic faith -- it's like fire makes steel stronger, so too strange statements about The Church's teachings on purgatory and the TRUTH about it (as a process) makes us draw closer to The Church and indeed makes us better Christians sharing in Christ's Church, the One Holy Apostolic Catholic Church.

[Cronos]

Sigh... I said it before, will say it again and repeat what The Church teaches --> Christ's sacrifice was SUPER-Sufficient for our Salvation.

The Church teaches that nothing we can do to purify ourselves --> God purifies us to come into His presence

Purgatory or washing or whatever you want to call it exists as a cleansing process. Yes, only God knows.

You're right that this is very abstract, yet this is a belief practised right from Early Christianity and praying for the dead. Does this really affect you as a Christian? Is it the central tenet of your belief? If you take it's underlying meaning which is that God loves you so much even if you have the stain of sin, He washes you to make you worthy of His presence, even AFTER He sacrificed Himself for you, then yes this is a part of the overall message of Christianity -- of a God of love who died for us, who does everything to save us except for dragging us kicking and screaming to heaven, of a God who even washes us (I take the washing analogy further -- we are dirty and barefoot and have trudged through muck to come to Our Lord's House made of shining clean marble -- the Lord has invited us, the Lord has provided us with the gate pass, we are in, yet do we trudge in with dirt into a place where dirt cannot stand? NO, we get washed by God.

You're right that we don't know what this washing process is -- maybe we just step over the threshold and get zapped clean, maybe it takes more "time", God knows. Yet praying for those in this case is good as praying always is good.

[Mad Dawg]

I completely agree about the delightful quality of the conversation we can have when we don't do the "nanny nanny boo boo" stuff. I thank you and I thank God.

It appears that this is what is behind the belief of purgatory. Just a little more discomfort before finally being let into your reward. God is not sadistic ....

Some nuns, on the other hand .... One of the friars here, 68 years old and one of the funniest guys I know, has a whole riff on "Sr. Mary Sadistica."

I can go this far with you at least: A LOT of Catholics seem to have a little sadistic streak which they often turn inwards. I'm guessing it's cultural and/or the devil's work. I say this because I worked for a while with a guy who professed to be an atheist, though he was brought up Catholic. And there was certainly a sadistic streak there.

And in my chapter of lay Dominicans there is a lady afflicted with "scrupulosity" (which I often think is just a cover for a personality disorder -- an illness rather than a sin.) And she seems just unable to accept that just as she is, right now, before she brushes and sprays her hair and slathers on the makeup -- either physical or spiritual -- God love here with a complete and undying love.

So she can take any suggestion that maybe this or that prayer or whatever and pervert it into another futile attempt to earn God's love.

So when (which God forbid) she teaches, she will certainly manage to convey this nastiness.

But, I say again, though there are torments aplenty in Dante's depiction of Purgatory, the whole atmosphere is one of joy. I see that it's hard to wrap one's mind around that. But while I have a healthy fear of pain, just as I looked forward to the therapist's seeming to try to pull my arm out of its socket when I went to PT, because I KNEW I was getting stronger and better, so also I look forward to purgation, whenever it happens.

This is not an attempt to persuade you of the doctrine, but an attempt to convey what I take to be a more accurate 'vibe' than that conveyed by Sr Mary Sadistica or my sister in my chapter, poor thing.

[sigzero]

Except...the Bible doesn’t support purgatory AT ALL. In fact, it supports the opposite very clearly.

[Mad Dawg]

To say that the Bible does not support purgatory is one thing. To say that it supports the opposite "very clearly" is possibly wrong and at the best undiplomatic.

Intelligent and studious people of good will and great learning are divided on this issue. Since that is the case, to say what amounts to "It's obvious," is to deny the studiousness, intelligence, and the good will of those who take another view. It is hard to imagine how that can be done politely.

Further, it is unnecessary. If it is so very clear that those who disagree with you are wrong, then instead of merely saying so, make the case.

Of course, in a polite conversation, to make one's case is to say one is prepared to listen while the others at the table express their opinion that the case has not been made. The only redeeming aspect of this patience-taxing effort is that sometimes one learns better what one's case is and how it might be made more persuasively.

It is fine to be confident that one is right. But one ought to remember that the other side is also confident that IT is right. And if one expects to be treated politely and respectfully when making one's case, it seems a matter of common courtesy that one ought to treat those with whom one disagrees politely and respectfully.

[ichabod1]

Welcome home. I too am a cradle Episcopalian who longed for the fullness of the faith and was confirmed Catholic at Eastertide 2006. We do not know when a soul is released from Purgatory because we are “in time.” Heaven, hell and purgatory are outside of time. I imagine it to be like a dream, where things happen, scenes switch, we move around in time from time to time as we do from place to place. I do not fear purgatory. I welcome it. I don’t think it’s a “bad” place. I don’t think it’s intended to be painful. I can see how the longing for Him might be much like ours is today, but more poignant because we can feel him nearer, maybe even see him. I think day to day in purgatory we work, much like we do now, to atone, expunge, cleanse ourselves and our souls from sin.

On one thing I can agree with the prots. If you don’t confess Jesus, you go to hell. Period, end of. I don’t see why you can’t confess Jesus after death, I don’t know if Hell is really a one way trip, but I like C.S. Lewis’ conception of hell in the Celestial Omnibus - a dirty, grim, twilight, grey urban setting where a horse drawn bus comes by daily. If the denizens get on, they are taken to a beautiful meadow with all the comforts they have been lacking. Sadly, on being told that all they need to to enter therein is to give up their greed, their gluttony, their hatred, and admit that Jesus is Lord, they all get back on the bus and return to the dim nether region.