Diocese of Springfield - Cape Girardeau at 601 S. Jefferson, Springfield, MO 65806 US - Purgatory Spiritual ‘Wash Room’ October 30, 2009

Purgatory

As November marks the month in which we are encouraged to especially remember the faithful departed in our Masses and prayers, including All Souls Day on Nov. 2, it would be good to consider the subject of purgatory. After all, why pray for the dead if there is no purgatory?

Many passages from sacred Scripture allude to purgatory, and the Church’s doctrine is drawn from the tradition that refers to these texts. Purgatory is a truth about which we have incomplete knowledge because it is an experience a soul has after death. Because of this, the Church’s teaching is somewhat restrained: “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” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1030).

In speaking about this wonderful truth of our Faith, I have always found analogies from everyday life helpful. In this case, experiences from childhood help. The first is that of cleaning and healing a wound. The word purge, from which purg-a-tory comes, means “to cleanse.” When I was a boy, I had many scrapes of knees and elbows. I would present my bleeding wound to my mother and she would always respond with the same routine: wash with soap and hot water, followed by a flushing with hydrogen peroxide, and lastly, the dreaded merthiolate (which I understand has been removed from the market)!

Each of these applications of cleansing my scrape involved a progression of pain, which I assumed was related to the germs being killed along with my healing. In other words, the removal of the bad things (infection, germs) restoring health involved some burning pain. The same is true with purgatory, except in a spiritual sense. The fire of God’s love burns away all the non-mortal sins and selfish attachments that are still a part of one’s life, and the soul is set free to love God completely, its holiness completed. We see the same process in all kinds of cleansing processes that make one whole again: they involve a suffering which comes from having something bad removed. What is true for the body is also true for the soul.

Another analogy from childhood might be helpful. As a boy, I would often come into dinner after playing, my hands and face dirty. My parents would instruct me to wash before I was allowed to sit down at the table. The same is true of heaven, which is sometimes described as a wedding banquet (see Mt 22; Lk  12:36 and 14:8; Rev 19:9). Before entering the perfect communion of heaven and the “wedding feast of the Lamb,” we must be totally cleansed and made holy.  Analogously, purgatory is the spiritual “wash room” before the “feast” of heaven.

If this cleansing is not accomplished through our repentance and penance in this life, God will accomplish it after we die. Because this is a process of love, we, the living, can assist the dead because we are in a communion of love with them in Christ’s mystical body, the Church. Again, purgatory does not apply to those who die unrepentant of mortal sins, but is only for those who are in a state of grace and friendship with God at the moment of death, but imperfectly purified.

Purgatory, therefore, is not eternal. In the end, it will lead to the experience of heaven. In this sense, it is a good thing, even though it involves very real and profound suffering. Mindful of this, let us remember our beloved dead as well as those unknown to us who, perhaps, have no one to pray for them or do penance for them.

The words of St. John Chrysostom reflect well the Church’s exhortation that we give alms, offer indulgences, and works of penance and prayer on behalf of the dead: “Let us help and commemorate them. If Job’s sons were purified by their father’s sacrifice, why would we doubt that our offerings for the dead bring them some consolation? Let us not hesitate to help those who have died and to offer our prayers for them.”