Replies

Mr. Rogers:

First off, I appreciate the non-polemical tones of your posts, even though you and I have disagreements on certain theological points. Hopefully, I have also made my points in non-polemical ways as well.

Purgatory has to be understood in the context of how Catholics understand Grace and sin. Sin ruptures and breaks our communion with God and it is Grace that justifies us and makes us Holy. Thus, Grace, from the Catholic perspective is “transformative” and not just a covering of God’s Grace, which is the classic Protestant understanding. The Catechism discusses Grace in paragraph 1996 and 1997:

1996 Our justification comes from the grace of God. Grace is favor, the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life.

1997 Grace is a participation in the life of God. It introduces us into the intimacy of Trinitarian life: by Baptism the Christian participates in the grace of Christ, the Head of his Body. As an “adopted son” he can henceforth call God “Father,” in union with the only Son. He receives the life of the Spirit who breathes charity into him and who forms the Church.

The Catechism states that as sanctifying Grace, God shares his divine life and friendship with us in a habitual gift, a stable and supernatural disposition that enables the soul to live with God and act by his love. As actual grace, God gives us the help to conform our lives to his will.

With respect to Purgatory, the Catechism states:

1031 The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned. 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:

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.

I have already cited 1 Corinthians 3:15 as a passage consistent with Purgatory, and this passage along with Matthew 12:31; 1 Peter 1:7, 2 Mac 12:46 are all cited in the CCC 1031 cited above.

Now, I acknowledge that scripture passages can have multiple meanings, all being true. In fact, this is in line with Catholic Doctrine. For example, the Catholic Church interprets scripture through Typology (see CCC 128-130), i.e. the Old Testament signs, persons and events prefigure Christ and find there conclusion in Christ, and thus the Epistles are interpreted in the context of Christ and the four Gospels (e.g., Gospels are central, see CCC 127). The Catholic Church also uses the “Four Senses” of Scripture approach to get the fullness of revelation from the Sacred Scriptures (see CCC para 115-119). Link to Catholic Catechism and Catholic principles for interpreting Sacred Scripture follows:

http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt1sect1chpt2.shtml

Thus, I don’t disagree with the interpretation of 1 Corinthians 3:12-16, that you gave in a previous post, in that yes, Christians will face trials during this life with respect to their faith and passing through fire could mean an allegorical image of those who remain committed to Christ will be saved. However, while I agree that interpretation is a good one, and is not unorthodox, the interpretation that I referenced about 1 Cor 3:15 being seen as purgatory is also a possible interpretation, and thus I believe both are possible and don’t detract from each other.

Furthermore, the interpretation that 1 Cor. 3:15 is part of the theological tradition of St. Augustine as he writes in his Explanation of the Psalms [i.e. a collection of Homilies/sermons and commentaries written on the Psalms from 392 to 418 AD] as follows:

“Lord rebuke me not in Your indignation, nor correct me in Your anger [c.f. Psalm 38:2]….In this life You may cleanse me and make me such that I have no need of corrective fire, which is for those who are saved, but as if by fire…For it is said “He shall be saved, but as if by fire [c.f. 1 Cor 3:15]. And because its says he shall be saved, little is thought of that fire. Yet plainly though, we be saved by fire, that fire will be more severe than anything a man can suffer in this life”

In his defense of the Book of Genesis [written 388-395 AD] against the Manicheans [who were dualistic and thus had problems with Creation and the fact that God had given man free will], St Augustine uses the term “purgatorial fires” as he writes:

“The man who has cultivated that remote land (c.f. Genesis 3:17) and who has gotten his bread by his very great labor is able to suffer this labor to the end of life. After this life, however, it is not necessary that he suffer. But the man who perhaps has not cultivated the land and has allowed it to be overrun with brambles has in this life the curse of the land on all his works, and after this life he will have either purgatorial fire or eternal punishment.”

St. Augustine talks of purgatorial fires in his reflection “Faith and Works” (413 AD) and The Enchiridion of Faith, Hope and Love {421 AD}, and also speaks of the doctrine of purgatory in The City of God, as I mentioned earlier [413-426 AD].

The Doctrine of Purgatory is consistent the Liturgical Rites of the early Church, both West and East [St. Cyril of Jerusalem in Cathechetical Lectures, 350 AD; St Gregory of Nyssa in Sermon on the Dead, 382 AD, and St. John Chrysostom in Homilies on 1 Corinthians, 392 AD], which offered prayers for the Dead at Liturgy [c.f. 2 Macabees 12: 43-46].

With respect to Praying for the Dead at Liturgy, St. Augustine writes in his Sermons [391-430 AD] “There is an ecclesiastical discipline, as the faithful know, when the names of the martyrs are read aloud in that place at the altar of God, where prayer is not offered for them. Prayer, however, is offered for other dead who are remembered. For it is wrong to pray for a martyr, to whose prayers we ought ourselves be commended .”

Again, St. Augustine writes in his Sermons [391 to 430 AD] “ But by the prayers of the holy Church, and by the salvific sacrifice, and by the alms which are given for their spirits, there is no doubt that the dead are aided, that the Lord might deal more mercifully with them than their sins would deserve. The whole Church observes this practice which was handed down by the Fathers: that it prays for those who have died in the communion of the body and blood of Christ, when they are commemorated in their own place in the sacrifice itself; and the sacrifice is offered also in memory of them, on their behalf. If, then, works of mercy are celebrated for the sake of those who are being remembered, who would hesitate to recommend them, on whose behalf prayers to God are not offered in vain? It is not at all to be doubted that such prayers are of profit to the dead.”

So again, while you you may not agree with the doctrine of Purgatory, the Catholic Church’s doctrine is well grounded in both Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition and is cleary within the expression of faith in the early Church.

Regards