Purgatory, Mary Anne Madden Sadlier [books to get back into reading .txt] 📗

All this supposes a Purgatory.

"The measure of the pain," says St. Gregory Nyssa, "is the quantity of evil to be found in each one.... Being either purified during the present life by means of prayer and the pursuit of wisdom, or, after departure from this life, by means of the furnace of the fire of purgatory."

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Not only deeply instructive, but also eminently consoling is the doctrine of Purgatory. We need not "mourn as those who have no hope," for those nearest and dearest who have gone hence and departed this life in the friendship of God.

How beautifully our Holy Mother the Church bridges over the terrible chasm of the grave! How faithfully and tenderly she comes to our aid in the saddest of our griefs and sorrows! She leaves us not to mourn uncomforted, unsustained. She chides us not for shedding tears over our dear lost ones - a beloved parent, a darling child, a loving brother, affectionate sister, or deeply-cherished friend or spouse. She bids us let our tears flow, for our Saviour wept at the grave of Lazarus.

She whispers words of comfort - not unmeaning words, but words of divine hope and strength - to our breaking hearts. She pours the oil of heavenly consolation into our deepest wounds. She bids us cast off all unseemly grief, assuring us that not even death itself can sever the bond that unites us; that we can be of service to those dear departed ones whom we loved better than life itself; that we can aid them by our prayers and good works, and especially by, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Thus may we shorten their time of banishment, assuage their pains, and continue to storm Heaven itself with our piteous appeals until the Lord deign to look down in mercy, open their prison doors, and admit them to the full light of His holy presence, and to the everlasting embrace of their Redeemer and their God.


EXTRACTS FROM "CATHOLIC BELIEF."

VERY REV. FAÁ DI BRUNO. [1]

[Footnote 1: Catholic Belief, or, A Short and Simple Exposition of Catholic Doctrine, by Very Rev. Joseph Faá Di Bruno. D. D., Rector- General of the Pious Society of Missions of the Church of San Salvatore in Onde, Ponte Sisto, Rome, and St. Peter's Italian Church in London. American Edition, edited by Father Lambert, author of Notes on Ingersoll, &c.]

As works of penance have no value in themselves except through the merits of Jesus Christ, so the pains of Purgatory have no power in themselves to purify the soul from sin, but only in virtue of Christ's Redemption, or, to speak more exactly, the souls in Purgatory are able to discharge the debt of temporal punishment demanded by God's justice, and to have their venial sins remitted only through the merits of Jesus Christ, "yet so as by fire."

The Catholic belief in Purgatory rests on the authority of the Church and her apostolic traditions recorded in ancient Liturgies, and in the writings of the ancient Fathers: Tertullian, St. Cyprian, Origen, Eusebius of Cæsarea, Arnobius, St. Basil, St. Ephrem of Edessa, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Ambrose, St. Epiphanius, St. John Chrysostom, St. Jerome, St. Augustine. It rests also on the Fourth Council of Carthage, and on many other authorities of antiquity.

That this tradition is derived from the Apostles, St. John Chrysostom plainly testified in a passage quoted at the end of this chapter, in which he speaks of suffrages or help for the departed.

St. Augustine tells us that Arius was the first who dared to teach that it was of no use to offer up prayers and sacrifices for the dead; and this doctrine of Arius he reckoned among heresies. (Book of Heresies, Heresy 53d.)

There are also passages in Holy Scripture from which the Fathers have confirmed the Catholic belief on this point.

St. Paul, in his first epistle to the Corinthians, chap. iii. 11-15, writes: "For other foundations no one can lay, but that which is laid; which is Christ Jesus. Now, if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire."

The ancient Fathers, Origen in the third century, St. Ambrose and St. Jerome in the fourth, and St. Augustine in the fifth, have interpreted this text of St. Paul as relating to venial sins committed by Christians which St. Paul compares to "wood, hay, stubble," and thus with this text they confirm the Catholic belief in Purgatory, well known and believed in their time, as it is by Catholics in the present time. In St. Matthew (chap. v. 25, 26) we read, "Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him; lest, perhaps, the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. Amen, I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing."

On this passage, St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, a Father of the third century, says: "It is one thing to be cast into prison, and not go out from thence till the last farthing be paid, and another to receive at once the reward of faith and virtue: one thing in punishment of sin to be purified by long-suffering and purged by long fire, and another to have expiated all sins of suffering (in this life); one in fire, at the day of Judgment to wait the sentence of the Lord, another to receive an immediate crown from Him." (Epist. iii.)

Our Saviour said: "He that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him in this world, nor in the world to come." (St. Matt. xii. 32.)

From this text St. Augustine argues, that "It would not have been said with truth that their sin shall not be forgiven, neither in this world, nor in the world to come, unless some sins were remitted in the next world." ( De Civitate Dei , Book xxi. chap. 24.)

On the other hand, we read in several places in Holy Scripture that God will render to every one (that is, will reward or punish) according as each deserves. See, for example, in Matthew xvi. 27. But as we cannot think that God will punish everlastingly a person who dies burdened with the guilt of venial sin only, it may be an " idle word ," it is reasonable to infer that the punishment rendered to that person in the next world will be only temporary.

The Catholic belief in Purgatory does not clash with the following declarations of Holy Scripture, which every Catholic firmly believes, namely, that it is Jesus who cleanseth us from all sin, that Jesus bore "the iniquity of us all," that "by His bruises we are healed," (Isaias iii., 5); for it is through the blood of Jesus and His copious Redemption that those pains of Purgatory have power to cleanse the souls therein detained.

Again, the Catholic belief in Purgatory is not in opposition to those texts of Scripture in which it is said that a man when he is justified is "translated from death to life;" that he is no longer judged: that there is no condemnation in him. For these passages do not refer to souls taken to Heaven when natural death occurs, but to persons in this world, who from the death of sin pass to the life of grace. Nor does it follow that dying in that state of grace, that is, in a state of spiritual life, they must go at once to Heaven. A soul may be justified, entirely exempt from eternal condemnation , and yet have something to suffer for a time; thus, also, in this world, many are justified, and yet are not exempt from suffering.

Again, it is not fair to bring forward against the Catholic doctrine on Purgatory that text of the Apocalypse, Rev. xix. 13: "Blessed are the dead, who die in the Lord. From henceforth now, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors: for their works follow them," for this text applies only to those souls who die perfectly in the Lord, that is, entirely free from every kind of sin, and from the stain , the guilt , and the debt of temporal punishment of every sin. Catholics believe that these souls have no pain to suffer in Purgatory, as is the case with the martyrs and saints who die in a perfect state of grace.

It is usual to bring forward against the Catholic belief in Purgatory that text which says: "If the tree fall to the south, or to the north, in what place soever it shall fall, there shall it be." (Eccles. xi. 3.)

This text confirms and illustrates the truth that, when death comes, the final doom of every one is fixed, and that there is no possibility of changing it; so that one dying in a state of mortal sin will always remain in a state of mortal sin, and consequently be rejected forever; and one dying in a state of grace and friendship with God, will forever remain accepted by God and in a state of grace, and in friendship with Him.

But this text proves nothing against the existence of Purgatory; for a soul, although in a state of grace, and destined to heaven, may still have to suffer for a time before being perfectly fit to enter upon the eternal bliss, to enjoy the vision of God.

Some might be disposed, notwithstanding, to regard this text as opposed to the Catholic doctrine of Purgatory by saying that the two places alluded to in the texts are heaven and hell. But this interpretation Catholics readily admit, for at death either heaven or hell is the final place to which all men are allotted, Purgatory being only a passage to heaven. This text surely does not tell against those just ones under the Old Law who died in a state of grace and salvation, and who, though sure of heaven, had yet to wait in a middle state until after the Ascension of Jesus Christ; neither, therefore, does it tell against Purgatory.

Christ's Redemption is abundant, " plentiful " as Holy Scripture, says (Ps. cxxix. 7), and Catholics do not believe that those Christians who die guilty only of venial the practice of the Catholic Church to offer prayers and other pious works in suffrage for the dead, as is amply testified by the Latin Fathers; for instance, Tertullian, St. Cyprian, St. Augustine, St. Gregory; and amongst the Greek Fathers, by St. Ephrem of Edessa, St. Basil and St. John Chrysostom. St. Chrysostom says: "It was not without good reason ordained by the Apostles that mention should be made of the dead in the tremendous mysteries, because they knew well that, these would receive great benefit from it" (on the First Epistle to Philippians, Homily iii.) By the expression "tremendous mysteries," is meant the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

St. Augustine says: "It