It's been quite a long time but the celebration still rings on the bells of every individual in town. Our mother is been remembered throughout the whole world. How nice the soothing weather, how fragrant the evening breeze as they all, both physical and natural join in the celebration of today....
Dominus vobiscum
The Trinity is the foundational doctrine of God in the Christian faith. Although the word itself was not used in Scripture, it can be shown that the Scripture teaches the essential truths whichlead to the doctrine. In essence, the doctrine of the Trinity explainshow the following apparently incompatible statements can be true: 1. There is only one God ( Rom 3:30 , etc.) 2. The Father is God ( 1 Cor 8:6 , etc.) 3. Jesus is God ( John 1:1 , etc.) 4. The Holy Spirit is God ( 1 Cor 6:19 , etc.) 5. Jesus is not the Father ( John 1:1 , Luke 3:21-22 , etc.) 6. Jesus is not the Spirit ( Luke 3:21-22 , etc.) 7. The Father is not the Spirit ( Luke 3:21-22) ) The Trinity tells us that there are three Persons in one Divine Nature. The names Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are names of persons . God can serve as either a name for the Father or a name for the Divine Nature. Before delving into the relative meaning of Persons and Natures it will be useful to make it clear that these terms refer to distinctly different things. I will attempt to clarify this with an analogy. My hand has five fingers, but all five fingers are parts of one hand (and the words finger and hand do not refer to the same kind of thing). It is appropriate, therefore, that I will arrive at a different number if I count fingers than hands. Likewise, Person and Nature are different things, and when I applythese words to God I find that there are three of the former and one of the later. As useful as analogies can be to explain a concept, in all cases we find that analogies can only provide an accurate picture to a certain extent. Therefore it is useful to point out the places where they fail, and to provide a variety of them. We will then be able to proceed to an understanding by comparison and contrast. The analogy of fingers and hands breaks down in the following ways: 1. God is not composed of matter. Instead his Nature refers to the eternal perfections that he possesses: Love, Goodness, Power, etc. 2. God is not composed of parts. If God were composed of parts, then it would be necessary to have a cause for the arrangement of the parts, and something else would be fundamental. 3. There is only one Divine Nature. While there can be many hands, there can only be one Divine Nature. One can now construct another analogy to consider the Persons and Nature of God. We can say that the persons are like dimensions, and the Nature is like three-dimensional space. The dimensions are indeed distinct realities, which we may term height, width, and depth, but we cannot call them parts, nor can weremove one dimension from the space in which we live. Three-dimensional space is composed ofthree inseparable dimensions. This analogy fails at a certain point to describe God as well, because there is really no way to distinguish one spatial dimension as special or different from the others. As yet, however, we have only discussed how something can be different and yet inseparable. We cannot yet comprehend what the meanings of the words Person and Nature are. Persons are objects and sources both of communication, and of love. St. Augustine explains the passage"God is love" ( 1 John 4:8 ) by noting that if God is to be "love" for all eternity, then there must always exist Divine Persons in Godto love one another. Ludwig Ott suggests that we may think of Persons as somewhat analogous to personalities, John Henry Newman suggests that we might think of them as personifications of Divine attributes (i.e. the Son is the Wisdom of the God). The Divine Nature is that through which the Divine Persons are and through which they act. The Divine Nature is to the Divine Persons what the body is to a human person. However, as I noted before, the Divine Nature is not something material, rather it refers to the Divine Perfections as noted above. These next few points are somewhat detached from the above discussion, but it is useful to bring them up as they are common misinterpretations. Although the idea that the Divine Nature is Goodness, Love, etc. rules the interpretation of Divine Nature as a term meaning Divine species, the interpretation is voiced on occasion. This idea leads to the suggestion that the Divine Persons are just instances of this species. Divine Nature is not meant to be taken as a term for species in the doctrine of the Trinity, and if we do allow the term Divine species the doctrine of the Trinity only allows us to have one instance of it. One possible misinterpretation that one could make at this point would be to think of God as something like a man with a split personality. If you can imagine a split personality as a good thing, then this may have some merit, but it does not do justice to the unity of God. Believers in the Trinity recognize that there is but one Divine Will...
.. If you can imagine a split personality as a good thing, then this may have some merit, but it does not do justice to the unity of God. Believers in the Trinity recognize that there is but one Divine Will. This does not mean that the three Persons merely agree, but that there is numerically one Divine Will (there is a wrinkle on this, however, as the Son of God, since his Incarnation, also has a human willand thus we say that there are two wills in Christ ). It might be useful to discuss John 1:1 at this point. Once you have grasped this, it is worthwhile to note that there is an important related doctrine to the Trinity called the Incarnation . In fact, it is inseparable from the Trinity in discussions about the God. The doctrine of the Incarnation unites the apparently contradictory statements: Jesus is God, Jesus is man.
Of all the misunderstood Catholic teachings — and there are a few of them — purgatory is often seen as the most embarrassing. Of all the misunderstood Catholic teachings — and there are a few of them — purgatory is often seen as the most embarrassing. Thousands of Catholics leave the Church every year. Their faith is questioned and their religious education doesn’t rise to the challenge. You’ve probably heard these questions yourself: “Where in the Bible does it say you have to confess your sins to a priest?” “Where does it say that the pope is infallible?” “That Mary was conceived without original sin?” And, “Where in the world did you Catholics get the teaching on purgatory?” The typical conversation goes something like this: Non-Catholic: “So you’re a Roman Catholic?” Roman Catholic: “That’s right. I’m even a Notre Dame fan.” NC: “Do you believe everything theChurch teaches?” RC: “Well, yeah, I guess so.” NC: “Even purgatory?” RC: “I think so.” NC: “Well, let me get this straight. You believe in an all-loving God, don’t you?” RC: “Yeah!” NC: “Do you believe that this God sent His only begotten Son to die for you?” RC: “Sure!” NC: “So let me get this straight: You believe in an all-loving God, who loved you so much that He sent His only begotten Son to die for you, just so you can go to heaven when you die. Yet, this loving God first sticks you in a ‘cosmic oven’ and bakes you for a couple hundred years or so until you’re done?” RC: “Well, I’ve never really thought about it that way.” NC: “Where in the Bible does it say‘purgatory’?” About this time, our Catholic friend is looking for someplace to hide! He seems to have three equally unsatisfactory options. Option number one is blind faith: “I don’t know why I believe it, but I’m going to keep right on believing it anyway. After all, I’m Catholic, so don’t confuse me withthe facts!” Option two is an over-confident triumphalism: “Silly Fundamentalist! Where in the Bible really!” The third option is to run for the hills. Each of these options fails to take the situation seriously. Blind faith ignores the importance of an answer. Triumphalism ignores theimportance of the question. And running away fails to see the importance of reality. There is, however, another way: the way of constructive apologetics, which takes the question and the answer very seriously, and prayerfully begins to search the sacred texts and thestorehouses of apostolic Traditionto find the truth about these important issues. The case against purgatory seemsto be based on three major objections. First, the teaching of purgatory seems to contradict thefinished work of Christ and offendthe basic understanding of God asa loving, all-caring, all-merciful Godwho has forgiven our sins in Christ Jesus. Second, purgatory seems to offer a “second chance” for those who did not follow Christ in this life. Third, purgatory does not appear to be a biblical teaching. Before examining the truth about purgatory, let’s take a look at these objections and see why they should be taken seriously. Scripture stresses the truth of God’s love, and Evangelical Protestants have frequently had a powerful experience of Christ’s forgiveness. St. John explains: “In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the expiation for our sins” (1 Jn. 4:10). Jesus Christ Himself stresses mercy over judgment, stating, Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, buthas passed from death to life” (Jn.5:24). Scripture teaches us about a God who “so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3:16). The Christian believer is called to accept the mercy of God as all-powerful, capable of overcoming all sin, and yet the Catholic who holds the teaching of purgatory seems to belittle God’s forgiveness. From this perspective, God appears almost schizophrenic, wanting to forgive our sins and yet meticulously holdus accountable for them, at one time cleansing us from all unrighteousness (cf. 1 Jn. 1:9) andthen later deciding to “fry us” for displeasing Him. Have we “passed out of judgment” (cf. Jn. 5:24) or haven’t we? Has Christ forgiven our sins, or hasn’t He? The second objection against purgatory is that it is a manufactured second chance. If you don’t really want to follow Christ, you can still get to heaven through the “backdoor.” Yet Scripture is clear that spiritual mediocrity is unacceptable (cf. Rev. 3:15-16). Jesus calls for complete commitment. He is either Lord of all, or He isn’t Lord at all. There is no second chance; we are either for Christ or against Him (cf. Lk. 11:23)...
The doctrine of purgatory seems to be an “end run.” But Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; noone comes to the Father, but by me” (Jn. 14:6). The third argument against the doctrine of purgatory flows from a main dogma of Protestant theology, sola scriptura (“the Biblealone”). After all, where in the Bible do we find purgatory? A quick word check in any concordance will demonstrate that the word is nowhere to be found in Scripture. There’s no discussion of some third place between heaven and hell. Surely something as important as purgatory would be clearly taughtin the pages of Scripture! Purgatory also appears to be “guilty by association”: The doctrine is caught up in the “Catholic collection” of the intercession of the saints, indulgences, the sacrifice of the Mass, and other items that are perceived as “unbiblical” and the fruit of mere human tradition. As Christ warns, “[F]or the sake of your tradition, you have made void the word of God” (Mt. 15:6). These views are held by very sincere Christians, men and women with whom we are unitedin Baptism. Catholics have an obligation to take these issues seriously. When Curtis began to investigate the teaching of purgatory, he knew that it wasn’t enough to simply ask, “Where in the Bible is purgatory?”As a Christian, the two most fundamental truths that he held were the Trinity — three Persons in one God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — and the Incarnation, that the eternal Son, at a point in history, took on human nature and became man like us in all things but sin. And yet the words “Trinity” and “Incarnation” were nowhere in Scripture. That is to say, the words weren’t, but the teachings were. He then needed to go to the Bible and examine whether the teaching of purgatory — whether the word was there or not — wasto be found in the teachings of Christ and the apostles. He began tosearch the Gospels to see if Jesus gave any teachings concerning judgment or purification at the end of our earthly life. He began to see that several of Our Lord’s teachings, far from disproving purgatory, seemed to point to the possibility that there might be some debt of justice that would be paid after our earthly life. As Christ teaches about the importance of forgiveness, He gives the example of a king who wished to settle accounts with hisslaves. He brought in a man who owed a great deal of money and forgave him the debt. The forgiven man in turn went out and met one of his fellow slaves, who owed him but a fraction of the amount, and demanded repayment. The just king summoned his slave back and said, “You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you besought me; and should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?” And in anger his lord delivered him to the jailers, till he should pay all his debt (Mt. 18:32-34). What was Jesus talking about? Scripture clearly teaches, “There istherefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1). And yet Our Lord Himself gives the example of a man who had been forgiven, afterward acted unjustly, and finally was handed over to repay all that he owed. Again in St. Luke’s Gospel, Our Lord challenges His followers to make peace with one another, so that they will not be handed over to the magistrate who would throw them into prison: “I tell you, you will never get out till you have paid the very last copper” (Lk. 12:59; cf. Mt. 5:26). Christ calls the believer, who has passed out of condemnation — the sentence of hell — to live a life of justice which will be exacted to the last cent. If this is not the case, then the teachings of Jesus makes no sense. The Catholic teaching about purgatory is that if, at the end of a Christian’s earthly life, this debt of justice was not satisfied, he shall be purified in purgatory before entering heaven. The teachings ofChrist did not seem to contradict this. But lack of contradiction is still a long way from proof. In St. Matthew’s Gospel there is a tremendous confrontation between Christ and the Pharisees, in which they accuse Him of exercising authority over demons by the power of Beelzebul, the “prince of demons” (Mt. 12:24). Jesus then warns them of the sin against the Holy Spirit and states, Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. And whoever says a word against the Son of man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come (Mt. 12:31-32). If this sin cannot be forgiven either in this age or in the age to come, some sins might be able to be forgiven in the age to come. Without using the word “purgatory,” Jesus is presenting teachings that seemed in harmony with the Catholic teaching on purgatory and were abit difficult to interprete from an Evangelical perspective...
...While he was far from ready to accept that Jesus was referring to purgatory, he was finding himself hard-pressed to come to any other conclusion. This “forgiveness of sins” and “the age to come,” the reference to a prison in which we would not be released until we had “paid the last cent” — this is certainly not heaven or hell. We never get out of hell, and heaven is no prison. He came across a passage in the New Testament that he found very surprising. While addressing the very issue of sin within the Christian community — those who were believers and had accepted the Lordship of Jesus Christ into their lives — St. Paul writes: For no other foundation can any one lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any one builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble — each man’s work will become manifest; for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work which any man has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire (1 Cor. 3:11-15). The passage is quite clear: Gold and silver, when placed into a furnace, would be purified; wood and hay would be burned away. As this is done, Scripture says we will suffer loss, but be saved “as through fire.” The image of purgatory was becoming more vivid as he read. What else could St. Paul be referring to? He can’t be referring to hell, because it’s clear that the people who undergo this “purifying fire” will be saved, while those who are in hell are lost forever. And yet he can’t be referring to heaven, because he mentions the suffering of loss, while in heaven every tear will be wiped away (cf. Rev. 21:4). Scripture teaches that God is a “consuming fire” (Heb. 12:29). The point St. Paul seems to make is that, as God draws us to Himselfafter death, there is a process of purification in the fire of God’s holy presence. God Himself purifies us of those imperfect deeds: the wood, hay, and stubble. And those works that are performed in faithfulness and obedience to Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, those of gold and silver, are purified. This purification is necessary because, as Scripture teaches of heaven — the new Jerusalem — and the temple within it, “Nothing unclean shall enter it” (Rev. 21:27). The biblical images of the purifying fire, through which the believer is saved while suffering loss, were now beginning to sound more and more like purgatory. But where is the word “purgatory?” he began to see that this question revealed an ignorance on his part. The Scriptures were written in Hebrew and Greek. “Purgatory” comes from the Latin word purgatorium. In Scripture, we do find references to an afterlife that is neither the hell of the damned nor heaven. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word sheol is used to describe this condition; in the New Testament, the Greek term is hades. He had always thought that hades was hell, but Scripture teaches very clearly that hades is not hell; it is distinct from gehenna, or the lake of fire which is the hell of the damned. In fact, the Book of Revelation describes how, at the end of time, death and hades are thrown into hell (gehenna). This is the second death, the lake of fire. Scripture teaches that at the end of time, there is no more death; and once the purification of all souls has taken place, there is no more need for hades. This same concept of sheol (in Hebrew), hades (in Greek), and purgatorium (in Latin) is purgatory as we have come to know it today (cf. Catechism, nos. 1030-32). The major objection to purgatory is that somehow it undermines the finished work of Christ. Is Christ’s death sufficient? Of courseit is! It is sufficient to win our redemption and to allow the Holy Spirit to sanctify us. The work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer, however, is the work of purification and sanctification. It is the application of the divine life won by Christ. Purgatory in no way should be viewed as a “second chance,” by which those who did not believe in and follow Christ can somehow “suffer their way into heaven,” despite their rejection of the Christian life. Jesus is clear that those who refuse to follow Him are guilty: “[H]e who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (Jn. 3:18). Spiritual purification is possible only for those who have been reconciled to God in this life (cf. 2 Cor. 5:18-20)...
...The concept of purification after death dates back to the Jews of pre-Christian times. Evidence of this can be seen in the Second Book of Maccabees. Catholics will quickly cite this as scriptural evidence for the reality of purgatory, but we must remember that Protestants do notaccept 2 Maccabees as scriptural. Nevertheless, objective readers will have to note that, even if the seven books of the Old Testament accepted by Catholics and rejectedby Protestants are not biblical, they are godly writings and worthy of our consideration. In 2 Maccabees, following a battle, the faithful Jews found out that their fallen comrades each carried with them sacred tokens of idols, which the law forbade the Jews to wear: [T]hey turned to prayer, beseeching that the sin which had been committed might be wholly blotted out. And the noble Judas exhorted the people to keep themselves free from sin, forthey had seen with their own eyes what had happened becauseof the sin of those who had fallen. He also took up a collection, man by man, to the amount of two thousand drachmas of silver, and sent it to Jerusalem to provide for a sin offering (2 Mac. 12:42-43). The sacred text notes that this was an honorable deed, and the passage closes with the statement, “Therefore he made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin”(2Mac.12:45). What is striking about this passage is not what it asserts, butwhat it takes for granted. This episode is not told in an apologetic style, as if to prove that prayer for the dead was a pious act, but rather assumes it. Moreover, once the Catholic Church is accepted as the Church that Christ founded, and thus as the Church that defines the canon of Scripture, the teaching in Maccabees takes on greater weight as inspired Scripture (cf. 2 Tim. 3:16). What is clear and undeniable is the solidarity the early Christians felt with the deceased. Many ancient Christian monuments call out for prayer. For example, the epitaph of a bishop named Abercius, composed toward the end of the second century, provides: “Standing by, I, Abercius, ordered this to be inscribed; truly, I was in my seventy-second year. May everyone who is in accord with this and who understands it pray for Abercius.” This practice of prayer for the deceased predates a fully developed defense of this practice, which was provided at the ecumenical councils of Lyons II (1274), Florence (1439-45), and Trent (1545-63). As he began reading the Church Fathers, he was struck not only by the confidence of these holy men and the reality of the purifying fire(cf. 1 Cor. 3:15), but also by how deeply the teaching was rooted in the apostolic Tradition. The historic evidence clearly pointed to a belief in a state of purification that would later be called “purgatory.” This term corresponded to the Hebrew concept of sheol, and to the Greekterm hades in the New Testament.This third and temporary state of purification is biblical, apostolic, historical and, most of all, true andcompletely reconcilable with the teachings of Jesus Christ in the Gospels. The doctrine of purgatory is completely reconcilable with a loving God who is a consuming fire. As we are drawn up into His love, into His very divine life — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — we begin to burn with that same divine fire, and those impurities towhich we have clung in this life must be burned away. This will inevitably involve suffering, as we let go of those imperfect things towhich we are attached. The hidden mystery behind the teaching of purgatory is our calling to live in God for all eternity, which requires us to giveperfectly of ourselves (cf. Mt. 5:48).Even with deep faith, the Christianlife is difficult. We are called to manifest heroic generosity, and yet generosity hurts in this life. Nomatter what we’re asked to give, we seem to run out — of time, of energy, of money. God calls us to acknowledge this weakness, this poverty, and to turn to Him and cry out for help that He might fill us with His grace. In heaven, generosity will not hurt; the lack of generosity will hurt. That is because in heaven God will give Himself to us fully and completely, holding nothing back. Our ability to receive from Him will be completely contingent upon our ability, in turn, to immediately give back. Otherwise, the gift of God would destroy us. Like strapping a water balloon onto a fire hydrant nozzle, we would explode! It is only when we learn the habit of complete and total self-giving that we will be able to experience the joy of heaven. Christians are called to accept the finished work of Jesus Christ, and to allow that work to be applied to our lives by the work of the Holy Spirit, so that those who are justified will be sanctified. For us it is impossible. But with God, all things are possible.... End!
The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines purgatory as a"purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven," which is experienced by those "who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified" (CCC 1030). It notes that "this final purification of the elect . . . is entirely different from the punishment of the damned" (CCC 1031). The purification is necessary because, as Scripture teaches, nothing unclean will enter the presence of God in heaven (Rev. 21:27) and, while we may die with our mortal sins forgiven, there can still be many impurities in us, specifically venial sins and the temporal punishment due to sins already forgiven. Two Judgments When we die, we undergo what iscalled the particular, or individual, judgment. Scripture says that "it isappointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment" (Heb. 9:27). We are judged instantly and receive our reward, for good or ill. We know at once what our final destiny will be. At the end of time, when Jesus returns, there will come the general judgment to which the Bible refers, for example, in Matthew 25:31-32: "When the Sonof man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate themone from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats." In this general judgment all our sins will be publicly revealed (Luke 12:2–5). Augustine said, in The City of God , that "temporary punishments are suffered by some in this life only, by others after death, by others both now and then; but all of them before that last and strictest judgment" (21:13). It is between the particular and general judgments, then, that the soul is purified of the remaining consequences of sin: "I tell you, you will never get out till you havepaid the very last copper" (Luke 12:59). Money, Money, Money One argument anti-Catholics oftenuse to attack purgatory is the ideathat the Catholic Church makes money from promulgating the doctrine. Without purgatory, the claim asserts, the Church would go broke. Any number of anti-Catholic books claim the Church owes the majority of its wealth to this doctrine. But the numbers just don’t add up. When a Catholic requests a memorial Mass for the dead—thatis, a Mass said for the benefit of someone in purgatory—it is customary to give the parish priest a stipend, on the principles that the laborer is worth his hire (Luke 10:7) and that those who preside at the altar share the altar’s offerings (1 Cor. 9:13–14). In the United States, a stipend is commonly around five dollars; butthe indigent do not have to pay anything. A few people, of course, freely offer more. This money goes to the parish priest, and priests are only allowed to receiveone such stipend per day. No one gets rich on five dollars a day, andcertainly not the Church, which does not receive the money anyway. But look at what happens on a Sunday. There are often hundredsof people at Mass. In a crowded parish, there may be thousands. Many families and individuals deposit five dollars or more into the collection basket; others deposit less. A few give much more. A parish might have four orfive or six Masses on a Sunday. The total from the Sunday collections far surpasses the paltryamount received from the memorial Masses. A Catholic "Invention"? Fundamentalists may be fond of saying the Catholic Church"invented" the doctrine of purgatory to make money, but they have difficulty saying just when. Most professional anti-Catholics—the ones who make their living attacking"Romanism"—seem to place the blame on Pope Gregory the Great, who reigned from A.D. 590–604. But that hardly accounts for the request of Monica, mother of Augustine, who asked her son, in the fourth century, to remember her soul in his Masses. This would make no sense if she thought her soul would not benefit from prayers, as would be the case if she were in hell or in the full gloryof heaven. Nor does ascribing the doctrine toGregory explain the graffiti in the catacombs, where Christians during the persecutions of the first three centuries recorded prayers for the dead. Indeed, 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 writtenduring the second century), refer to the Christian practice of praying for the dead. Such prayerswould have been offered only if Christians believed in purgatory, even if they did not use that namefor it. (See Catholic Answers’ Fathers Know Best tract The Existence of Purgatory for quotations from these and other early Christian sources.)
Why No Protests? Whenever a date is set for the"invention" of purgatory, you can point to historical evidence to show the doctrine was in existence before that date. Besides, if at some point the doctrine was pulled out of a clerical hat, why does ecclesiastical history record no protest against it? A study of the history of doctrinesindicates that Christians in the first centuries were up in arms (sometimes quite literally) if anyone suggested the least change in beliefs. They were extremely conservative people who tested a doctrine’s truth by asking, Was this believed by our ancestors? Was it handed on fromthe apostles? Surely belief in purgatory would be considered a great change, if it had not been believed from the first—so where are the records of protests? They don’t exist. There is no hint at all, in the oldest writings available to us (or in later ones, for that matter), that "true believers" in the immediate post-apostolic years spoke of purgatory as a novel doctrine. They must have understood that the oral teaching of the apostles, what Catholics call tradition, and the Bible not only failed to contradict the doctrine, but, in fact, confirmed it. It is no wonder, then, that those who deny the existence of purgatory tend to touch upon only briefly the history of the belief. They prefer to claim that the Bible speaks only of heaven and hell. Wrong. It speaks plainly of a third condition, commonly called the limbo of the Fathers, where the just who had died before the redemption were waiting for heaven to be opened to them. After his death and before his resurrection, Christ visited those experiencing the limbo of the Fathers and preachedto them the good news that heaven would now be opened to them (1 Pet. 3:19). These people thus were not in heaven, but neither were they experiencing the torments of hell. Some have speculated that the limbo of the Fathers is the same as purgatory. This may or may notbe the case. However, even if the limbo of the Fathers is not purgatory, its existence shows that a temporary, intermediate state is not contrary to Scripture. Look at it this way. If the limbo of the Fathers was purgatory, then this one verse directly teaches the existence of purgatory. If the limbo of the Fathers was a different temporary state, then the Bible at least says such a state can exist. It proves there can be more than just heaven and hell. "Purgatory Not in Scripture" Some Fundamentalists also charge, as though it actually proved something, "The word purgatory is nowhere found in Scripture." This is true, and yet it does not disprove the existence of purgatory or the fact that beliefin it has always been part of Church teaching. The words Trinity and Incarnation aren’t in Scripture either, yet those doctrines are clearly taught in it. Likewise, Scripture teaches that purgatory exists, even if it doesn’t use that word and even if 1 Peter 3:19 refers to a place other than purgatory. Christ refers to the sinner who"will not be forgiven, either in thisage or in the age to come" (Matt. 12:32), suggesting that one can be freed after death of the consequences of one’s sins. Similarly, Paul tells us that, when we are judged, each man’s work will be tried. And what happens if a righteous man’s work fails the test? "He will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire" (1 Cor 3:15). Nowthis loss, this penalty, can’t refer toconsignment to hell, since no one is saved there; and heaven can’t be meant, since there is no suffering ("fire") there. The Catholic doctrine of purgatory alone explains this passage. Then, of course, there is the Bible’s approval of prayers for the dead: "In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the dead to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin" (2 Macc. 12:43–45). Prayers are not needed by those in heaven, and no one can help those in hell. That means some people must be in a third condition, at least temporarily. This verse so clearly illustrates the existence of purgatory that, at thetime of the Reformation, Protestants had to cut the books of the Maccabees out of their Bibles in order to avoid accepting the doctrine
Prayers for the dead and the consequent doctrine of purgatoryhave been part of the true religionsince before the time of Christ. Not only can we show it was practiced by the Jews of the time of the Maccabees, but it has even been retained by Orthodox Jews today, who recite a prayer known as the Mourner’s Kaddish for eleven months after the death of aloved one so that the loved one may be purified. It was not the Catholic Church that added the doctrine of purgatory. Rather, any change in the original teaching has taken place in the Protestant churches, which rejected a doctrine that had always been believed by Jews and Christians. Why Go To Purgatory? Why would anyone go to purgatory? To be cleansed, for"nothing unclean shall enter [heaven]" (Rev. 21:27). Anyone who has not been completely freed of sin and its effects is, to some extent, "unclean." Through repentance he may have gained the grace needed to be worthy of heaven, which is to say, he has been forgiven and his soul is spiritually alive. But that’s not sufficient for gaining entrance into heaven. He needs to be cleansed completely. Fundamentalists claim, as an article in Jimmy Swaggart’s magazine, The Evangelist , put it, that "Scripture clearly reveals that all the demands of divine justice on the sinner have been completely fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It also reveals that Christ has totally redeemed, or purchased back, that which was lost. The advocates of a purgatory (and thenecessity of prayer for the dead) say, in effect, that the redemption of Christ was incomplete. . . . It hasall been done for us by Jesus Christ, there is nothing to be added or done by man." It is entirely correct to say that Christ accomplished all of our salvation for us on the cross. But that does not settle the question of how this redemption is appliedto us. Scripture reveals that it is applied to us over the course of time through, among other things, the process of sanctification through which the Christian is made holy. Sanctification involves suffering (Rom. 5:3–5), and purgatory is thefinal stage of sanctification that some of us need to undergo before we enter heaven. Purgatory is the final phase of Christ’s applying to us the purifying redemption that he accomplished for us by his death on the cross. No Contradiction The Fundamentalist resistance to the biblical doctrine of purgatory presumes there is a contradiction between Christ’s redeeming us onthe cross and the process by which we are sanctified. There isn’t. And a Fundamentalist cannotsay that suffering in the final stage of sanctification conflicts with the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement without saying that suffering in the early stages of sanctification also presents a similar conflict. The Fundamentalist has it backward: Our suffering in sanctification does not take away from the cross. Rather, the cross produces our sanctification, which results inour suffering, because "[f]or the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant; later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness" (Heb. 12:11). Nothing Unclean Purgatory makes sense because there is a requirement that a soul not just be declared to be clean, but actually be clean, before a man may enter into eternal life. After all, if a guilty soul is merely"covered," if its sinful state still exists but is officially ignored, then it is still a guilty soul. It is still unclean. Catholic theology takes seriously the notion that "nothing unclean shall enter heaven." From this it is inferred that a less than cleansed soul, even if "covered," remains a dirty soul and isn’t fit for heaven. It needs to be cleansed or"purged" of its remaining imperfections. The cleansing occurs in purgatory. Indeed, the necessity of the purging is taught in other passages of Scripture, such as 2 Thessalonians 2:13, which declares that God chose us"to be saved through sanctification by the Spirit." Sanctification is thus not an option, something that may or may not happen before one gets into heaven. It is an absolute requirement, as Hebrews 12:14 states that we must strive "for theholiness without which no one will see the Lord." NIHIL OBSTAT : I have concluded that the materials presented in this work are free of doctrinal or moral errors. Bernadeane Carr, STL, Censor Librorum, August 10, 2004 IMPRIMATUR : In accord with 1983 CIC 827 permission to publish this work ishereby granted. +Robert H. Brom, Bishop of San Diego, August 10, 2004.
The Bible does not mention the exact word “ purgatory ,” but instead it makes reference to a place which can be understood as what is referred to as purgatory . To claim that purgatory does not exist because the exact word does not appear in Scripture is afailure to understand Scripture . What exactly is Purgatory? The Bible contains references to many Christian doctrines, butfails to call them out byname. One might as well even deny that there is something called the Bible because no such name is found in the Bible. Furthermore, one might as well deny the Trinity, Incarnation, and so forth because these exact words are not found in the Bible. The name does not make the place; the place must exist first, then we give it a name. We call this place “purgatory” because it means “a cleansing place.” Therein souls are purged from the small stains of sin, which prevent their immediate entrance into Heaven. In the Old Testament The first mention of Purgatory in the Bible is in 2 Maccabees 12:46 : “Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from sin.” Some people do not accept Maccabees as book of the Bible. This is unfortunate since it is that their Bibles have been edited and are missing books. ( Find out Why Catholic Bibles Are Different ) Even if a person does not accept the book of Maccabees, it at least has historical value for we can learn what the pre-Christian community believed. In Chapter 12 of Second Maccabees we read Scriptural proof for Purgatory and evidence that the Jews had sacrifices offered for those of their brothers who had lost their lives in battle. That the Jews prayed for the dead shows that they believed in a place where they couldbe helped (which we now call purgatory ) and that the prayers of their living brothers and sisters could help them in that place. Thisis closely related to theCatholic doctrine of thecommunion of saints. During the Reformation in the 15th century, when Martin Luther was deciding to remove books from the Bible, these words in the book of Maccabees hadso clearly favored Catholic teaching, that the whole book was removed from the Protestant Bible. Unfortunately for Protestants, even if they feel that the book was not inspired, it still tells us of the practice of God’s chosen people. In the New Testament In Matthew 5:26 and Luke 12:59 Christ is condemning sin and speaks of liberation only after expiation. “Amen, I say to you, you will not be released until you havepaid the last penny.” Now we know that no last penny needs to be paid in Heaven and from Hell there is no liberation at all; hence the reference must apply to a third place. Matthew 12:32 says, “And whoever speaks aword against the Son of Man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the holySpirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.” Here Jesus speaks of sin against the Holy Spirit. The implication is that some sins can be forgiven in the world to come. We know thatin Hell there is no liberation and in Heaven nothing imperfect can enter it as we see in the next part. Sin is not forgivenwhen a soul reaches itsfinal destination because in heaven there is no need for forgiveness of sin and in hell the choice to go there is already made. Revelation 21:27 : “…but nothing unclean will enter it, nor anyone who does abominable things or tells lies.” The place that is to be entered (the place to which thispassage refers) is heaven (read the text around it for context). The Bible clearly implies a place for an intermediate state of purification after we die in the many passages which tell that God will reward orpunish according to a person’s life. What if purgatory really doesn’t exist? Ponder the following example. Imagine a Christian man, justifiedby the Lord, loses his temper and yells at his next door neighbors for letting their dog dig a hole in his yard. We can see that the man treated his neighbors rudely, albeit the neighbor’s behavior was also reprehensible. His actions would be considered a light sin (called venial sins by the Catholic Church). It’s not of the same moral weight as theft or murder, but it’s still a sin. After shouting at the neighbors, with all the anger and stress in his body the man walks into his house, has a heart attack, and dies having just committed a small sin in the final moments of his life. Remember, this man is Christian and justified by the Lord, yet has committed a sin. Does he go to heaven or does he go to hell? Are all sins created equal? No, all sins are not equal and even justified men of the Lord can make mistakes and sin. If purgatory didn’t exist, the man would go to hell for his small sin. God’s mercy is so great and our God is a just God that it seems unfathomable that he would condemn a justified man to hell for a small, yet unrepented sin...