Author: tomlirish

JESUS STRONGLY AND CLEARLY EMPHASIZES THE INDISSOLUBILITY OF MARRIAGE

“Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery” (Luke 16:18)

1. First and foremost let us look to the teaching of the Savior on Marriage and Divorce.

In the spiritual life discerning and doing the will of God is of fundamental importance. But sometimes, due to perplexing circumstances, we have difficulty discerning the will of God, and we wish that God would send us a text message with explicit instructions telling us what to do! But when it comes to marriage, Jesus has not left us wondering about his intentions: – Jesus has told us very explicitly that marriage is for keeps, forever, indissoluble. The emphasis in your marriage, therefore, must always be to make it work better, to increase your love for your spouse, to forgive faults, to persevere through the difficult times (that’s what God wills). God has pledged to provide the grace you need to make it all the way through to the end (“til death do us part”).

Jesus, who is God, speaks forcefully and with Divine authority about marriage. And if Jesus declared himself “Lord of the Sabbath” at Mark 2:27, it can be seen from his teaching on marriage and divorce that He also presents himself as Lord of Marriage (and indeed, as God, He is). Jesus’ most concise teaching is from Luke16:18, where he states:

“Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.” (see also Mark 10: 10-12)

And in Matthew’s Gospel Jesus invokes his authority – much to the amazement of the apostles – to prohibit divorce and remarriage, hearkening back to God’s original intent expressed in Genesis that marriage is an indissoluble bond:

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one’? So they are no longer two but one. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.” 7 They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?” He said to them, “For your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for unchastity, and marries another, commits adultery; and he who marries a divorced woman, commits adultery.” The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is not expedient to marry.” (Matt 19: 3-10, RSV-Catholic)

2. The teaching of Saint Paul

Saint Paul, invoking the teachings of Christ, teaches that if husband and wife separate, they cannot remarry. He states:

“To the married I give charge, not I but the Lord, that the wife should not separate from her husband 11 (but if she does, let her remain single or else be reconciled to her husband)—and that the husband should not divorce his wife.” (1 Cor. 7:10-11)

The Catholic Church confirms Jesus’ teaching that the marriage bond is indissoluble, and therefore encourages couples “to grow continually in their communion through day-to-day fidelity to their marriage promise of total mutual self-giving…and by the Eucharist received together” (see CCC 1644,1643, 1645-1650, and 2364). Pope Francis adds: “The holiness and indissolubility of Christian matrimony, often disintegrating under tremendous pressure from the secular world, must be deepened by clear doctrine and supported by the witness of committed married couples” (April 25, 2014). As the Apostolic successors of Jesus Christ it is incumbent upon the Pope and Bishops of the Catholic Church not to weaken marriage by lessening or weakening its indissoluble, sacramental character (please see my previous post, “The Dark Clouds of Eucharistic Ambiguity”).

CONCLUSION:

God’s will that marriage constitute an unbreakable union between husband and wife is powerfully manifested through the teaching of Jesus Christ. Indeed, this is good news, for what can be more important than knowing the will of God! What is there left to do then, for us married folks, but to become better husbands and wives, and to love our spouse with an even deeper love. And since marriage is a sacrament, Jesus has pledged Himself to our marriage, and we can depend upon his invincible help to get us through even the most difficult times.

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Note: The phrase, “except for unchastity,” mentioned in Matthew 19 (quoted above) is translated in the Greek as “porneia,” meaning an unlawful union such as the “porneia” mentioned by Saint Paul at 1 Cor. 5: 1-2, where a man had married his father’s wife. Divorce is permitted here because the union was unlawful to begin with. See page 41 of The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible, topical essay, “Jesus on Marriage and Divorce,” which provides further explanations, all prohibiting divorce and remarriage. The Church’s valid jurisdiction over annulments, which generally concerns impaired matrimonial consent or other reasons rendering the marriage null and void, is not the topic of this post. See CCC 1629.

REFERENCES: Our Savior And His Love For Us by Father Garrigou-LaGrange, who points to Jesus’ Lordship over marriage (TAN Books, Chapter II);Ignatius Catholic Study Bible (see note above); Marriage Is For Keeps by John F. Kippley, and his pamphlet, “Until Death do us Part,” published by Foundation for the Family; and Covenanted Happiness by Conrad Burke (Scepter Press). Burke says at page xvii: “The marriage covenant, with its commitment not to divorce, places demands on the spouses’ love for one another, and especially on their love for their children. But it is a condition of real happiness for all concerned in married and family life.”

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THE DARK CLOUDS OF EUCHARISTIC AMBIGUITY

“The Eucharist is too great a gift to tolerate ambiguity and depreciation.” (Saint Pope John Paul II)

Saint Pope John Paul II was clearly concerned about the dark clouds of Eucharistic ambiguity hovering over the Church. He therefore wrote an encyclical on the Eucharist where he specifically stated the following:

“It is my hope that the present Encyclical Letter will effectively help to banish the dark clouds of unacceptable doctrine and practice, so that the Eucharist will continue to shine forth in all its radiant mystery (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, no.10).”

This great Pope and Saint was deeply concerned about the “shadows” and “confusion” that obscured the sacramental nature of the Eucharist and even encouraged practices contrary to the well established disciplines of the Church. The Pope, expressing his own personal grief over these developments, said in the encyclical:

“Unfortunately…there are also shadows. In some places the practice of Eucharistic adoration has been almost completely abandoned. In various parts of the Church abuses have occurred, leading to confusion with regard to sound faith and Catholic doctrine concerning this wonderful sacrament. At times one encounters an extremely reductive understanding of the Eucharistic mystery. Stripped of its sacrificial meaning, it is celebrated as if it were simply a fraternal banquet. Furthermore, the necessity of the ministerial priesthood, grounded in apostolic succession, is at times obscured and the sacramental nature of the Eucharist is reduced to its mere effectiveness as a form of proclamation. This has led here and there to ecumenical initiatives which, albeit well-intentioned, indulge in Eucharistic practices contrary to the discipline by which the Church expresses her faith. How can we not express profound grief at all this? The Eucharist is too great a gift to tolerate ambiguity and depreciation (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, no. 10).”

In his encyclical on the Eucharist Pope John Paul II reaffirmed the teaching of the Council of Trent that one must be in a state of grace in order to properly receive Holy Communion. The Pope states:

“Along these same lines, the Catechism of the Catholic Church rightly stipulates that ‘anyone conscious of a grave sin must receive the sacrament of Reconciliation before coming to communion’. I therefore desire to reaffirm that in the Church there remains in force, now and in the future, the rule by which the Council of Trent gave concrete expression to the Apostle Paul’s stern warning when it affirmed that, in order to receive the Eucharist in a worthy manner, “one must first confess one’s sins, when one is aware of mortal sin (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, no.36).”

Furthermore, the Pope stresses in his encyclical the impossibility of sharing Holy Communion with other ecclesial communities.

“Precisely because the Church’s unity, which the Eucharist brings about through the Lord’s sacrifice and by communion in his body and blood, absolutely requires full communion in the bonds of the profession of faith, the sacraments and ecclesiastical governance, it is not possible to celebrate together the same Eucharistic liturgy until those bonds are fully re-established. Any such concelebration would not be a valid means, and might well prove instead to be an obstacle, to the attainment of full communion, by weakening the sense of how far we remain from this goal and by introducing or exacerbating ambiguities with regard to one or another truth of the faith. The path towards full unity can only be undertaken in truth. In this area, the prohibitions of Church law leave no room for uncertainty,⁹²in fidelity to the moral norm laid down by the Second Vatican Council (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, no.44).”

Finally, in his Apostolic Exhortation, Reconciliation and Penance (a document highly relevant to the proper reception of Holy Communion), Pope John Paul II warned the Church against trying to create a theological category out of psychological considerations and mitigating circumstances, stating:

“But from a consideration of the psychological sphere one cannot proceed to the construction of a theological category, which is what the ‘fundamental option’ precisely is, understanding it in such a way that it objectively changes or casts doubt upon the traditional concept of mortal sin.

While every sincere and prudent attempt to clarify the psychological and theological mystery of sin is to be valued, the Church nevertheless has a duty to remind all scholars in this field of the need to be faithful to the word of God that teaches us also about sin. She likewise has to remind them of the risk of contributing to a further weakening of the sense of sin in the modern world (no.17).”

In Familiaris Consortio ( no. 84) Pope John Paul II wrote that divorced and civilly remarried Catholics positively could not receive Holy Communion, for two very profound reasons:

“However, the church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon sacred scripture, of not admitting to eucharistic communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the church which is signified and effected by the eucharist. Besides this there is another special pastoral reason: If these people were admitted to the eucharist the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the church’s teaching about the indissolubility of marriage.”

The Bishops of the Synods on the Family convened by Pope Francis strongly reaffirmed the decisive authority of Familiaris Consortio in their final report to the Holy Father, making it the document of definite reference. The attempt by some Bishops (in the two Synods) to build a consensus to allow an exception for divorced and civilly remarried Catholics to receive Holy Communion did not occur. Familiaris Consortio is the definite law of the Church and stands supreme over any Eucharistic ambiguity some in the Church have tried to create, much to the confusion of the faithful.

Chapter Eight of Pope Francis’ Amoris Laetitia references the authority of Familiaris Consortio and nowhere claims to change or contradict it. As Cardinal Gerhard Mueller, Pope Francis’ prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said: “If Amoris Laetitia intended to rescind such a deeply rooted and such a weighty discipline, it would have expressed itself in a clear manner and it would have given the reasons for it. However, such a statement with such a meaning is not to be found in [the document]. Nowhere does the pope put into question the arguments of his predecessors.” Moreover, any claimed ambiguity in Amoris Laetitia must be read against the clear and decisive prohibition contained in No. 84 of Familiaris Consortio, which strictly prohibits Holy Communion for divorced persons who have remarried without an annulment. As Saint John Paul II reminds us, “The Eucharist is too great a gift to tolerate ambiguity and depreciation.”

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Photo Attribution: The photograph of Pope John Paul II by Lothar Schaack, Nov. 15, 1980, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Germanylicense. Attribution: Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F059404-0019 / Schaack, Lothar / CC-BY-SA (at Wikipedia article on Pope John Paul II, incorporated here by reference).

P.S. Pope John Paul II also penned the following important words pertinent to the subject matter of this note:

“In this context, appropriate allowance is made both for God’s mercy towards the sinner who converts and for the understanding of human weakness. Such understanding never means compromising and falsifying the standard of good and evil in order to adapt it to particular circumstances. It is quite human for the sinner to acknowledge his weakness and to ask mercy for his failings; what is unacceptable is the attitude of one who makes his own weakness the criterion of the truth about the good, so that he can feel self-justified, without even the need to have recourse to God and his mercy. An attitude of this sort corrupts the morality of society as a whole, since it encourages doubt about the objectivity of the moral law in general and a rejection of the absoluteness of moral prohibitions regarding specific human acts, and it ends up by confusing all judgments about values.” (Veritatis Splendor, 104).

Ref. I am grateful to Fr Raymond J de Souza for pointing out the importance of Reconciliation and Penance, no. 17, with respect to the issues in question.

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Seven Common Characteristics of the Saints

(Saint Martin de Porres)

There are many characteristics that the saints have in common, and here are seven that I have noticed, relying particularly on the great Father Faber:

1. THEY LIVED FOR THE GLORY OF GOD. Comment: The saints understood in an intense and radical manner that God is the Supreme Good of our lives, and so they patterned their lives to do all that they could for the Glory of God. In short, the saints realized that God is our true end and that nothing compares to the inestimable treasure we have in God.

2. THE SAINTS WORKED FOR THE SALVATION OF SOULS Comment: The saints knew that the mission of Jesus Christ is to save souls. Therefore, for the Glory of God, they devoted their lives to spreading of the Gospel for the salvation of souls. Faber puts it this was: “Jesus came into the world for the saving of souls. He died for them. He shed His Precious Blood for them. In proportion as souls are saved His interests prosper; in proportion as they are lost, His interests as the Savior of souls are injured. The soul is the only thing worth caring for. Only think what it is to be lost eternally?”

3. THE SAINTS PRACTICED GREAT DEVOTION TO MARY Comment: Study the lives of the saints. They loved Mary. They were devoted to her. Their love of God grew as they placed their confidence in Mary. The saints realized that Mary is a special gift of Jesus for his disciples.

4. THE SAINTS WERE DEVOTED TO PRAYER Comment: The saints realized that it is impossible to persevere and grow in holiness without prayer. They realized that prayer is the fuel that feeds the interior life: the life of personal relationship with God. They knew that to neglect prayer was akin to denying air to the body.

5. THE SAINTS WERE DEVOTED TO THE EUCHARIST Comment: The saints drew extraordinary strength from the Eucharist. To receive Jesus in Holy Communion was the great joy of their lives. They also had a great attraction to Eucharistic adoration.

6. THE SAINTS WERE DEVOTED TO THE POOR Comment: In imitation of Christ, the saints were filled with a special love for the poor. The more they loved God, the more they were attracted to help the poor.

7. THE SAINTS LOVED THE CHURCH Comment: The saints loved the Church, knowing as they did that the Church is the bride of Christ. They were steadfastly loyal to the doctrines and dogmas of the church, and even when unjustly wronged by church authorities they bore their burdens with peace of soul and waited on God to remedy such difficulties.

FROM FATHER FABER:

“The honor of God …is deeply implicated in the worship paid to the saint. In some sense [God] is more jealous of it than of His own; less patient of levity with [His saints] than with Himself, and frequently punishes persons for this [levity]. The saints themselves have entered into the dispositions of God, and, with a sort of vindictive holiness, hard for us in our present state to understand, resent familiarities and impertinences…. Faith is the chief ingredient in a true devotion to the saints; faith is the reality of their power, and of their relationship towards us. It is a great sign of a man being supernatural when he fears to offend a saint. The favors of the saints form a great department of the Divine Mercies, and play an important part in the sanctification of holy men…. Weakness of prayer is one of the feeblenesses of our times, through want of faith and fear; this is one way to set them right. We always fear those in whom we have confidence. We cannot ever put confidence in those whom we do not in some way fear.” From: Notes on Doctrinal and Spiritual Subjects, Volume I, pages 381-82.

I believe Father Faber is saying that we should hold the saints in great awe and reverence, and have great faith in the immense power of their intercession, because they have been so completely transformed into the life of God. Faber reminds us that such “great holiness is a thing to fear.” And this reverential fear of the saints will no doubt lead to a more sincere love of them and great confidence in their power to help us on our journey to Heaven.

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Ref. Primary inspiration: (especially for Nos. 1 & 2) All for Jesus by F.W. Faber

Image: According to Wikipedia: “Portrait of St. Martin de Porres, c. 17th century, Monastery of Rosa of Santa Maria in Lima. This portrait was painted during his lifetime or very soon after his death, hence it is probably the most true to his appearance.” Public Domain, U.S.A. My mother used to mention Saint Martin de Porres and Saint Rose of Lima, and these two saints are among my favorites. Saint Martin de Porres’ life was marked by amazing mystical phenomena.

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THE WORLD’S SHORTEST INDULGENCED PRAYER FOR THE SOULS IN PURGATORY

(Christian souls arrive in Purgatory singing and escorted by an angel, Canto II, Dante. Drawing by Gustave Dore)

“The faithful who apply indulgences as suffrages for the dead are practicing charity in a superior way and with their thoughts on the things of Heaven are dealing more virtuously with the things of earth.” (Apostolic Constitution on Indulgences)

My mission: to come up with a short but powerful devotion to the Holy Souls in Purgatory who are counting on our prayers so that they may advance to the one thing their hearts desire and yearn for: union with God.

Plan: Find the shortest indulgenced prayer possible that can be offered up all day long for the Holy Souls with virtually no effort.

Result: Consulted The Handbook of Indulgences and discovered on page 82, #55, that “a partial indulgence is granted the Christian faithful who devoutly sign themselves with the cross while saying the customary formula: “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

Now, an indulgenced prayer is normally made for your own benefit, but can be applied as a suffrage to the poor souls in Purgatory, thus reducing their sufferings in Purgatory and advancing them nearer to the one true goal of life: to be with God in Heaven. Those souls are counting on our prayers!

WONDERFUL EFFECTS OF THIS DEVOTION

(I am relying on Father Faber, who makes the following points in various contexts in All for Jesus; the whole inspiration and basic content for this note comes from him.)

1. You begin to make the Sign of the Cross with awesome reverence knowing you are helping the poor souls;

2. In practicing this devotion you grow closer to the Trinity as you say their names with tenderness and love; and you remind yourself, in signing yourself with the cross, that the cross is the true wisdom of God, i.e., love entails sacrifice;

3. You give great glory to God because you assist Him in the ultimate goal of His love: bringing souls to Heaven to praise Him;

4. You practice the theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Love because you practice faith in the supernatural value of this devotion as revealed by the Church, you hope for something you cannot see, and you show love for your brothers and sisters in Purgatory by making this prayer applicable to them;

5. You grow in holiness since this prayer, which could have been made for your own welfare as an indulgence to reduce your time in Purgatory, is given in loving sacrifice as a suffrage to the poor souls;

6. You develop a habit of devotion that keeps your mind attuned to the supernatural operation of grace and to the goal of life: salvation! (and this is an attitude which acts as an antidote to worldliness – our arch enemy); and

7. It is possible that when these souls reach Heaven they will pray for you and for your salvation – ALL THIS BY REVERENTLY MAKING THE SIGN OF THE CROSS A FEW TIMES A DAY with the preface of saying: “For the Holy Souls in Purgatory,” or for Grandpa Smith or Aunt Mary. How easy can Jesus make things for us! Or you could say, “MotherMary, For the poor souls in Purgatory you love so much.”

Now imagine for the next 40 years you made such an act of love, by making the sign of the cross for the poor souls 5 times a day (30 seconds of prayer). At the day of judgment, you will have said about 73,000 (seventy-three thousand) prayers for the poor souls in Purgatory! What an awesome devotion in the Communion of Saints!

For the souls in Purgatory: “In the Name of the Father….”

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Source: All for Jesus, F.W. Faber

Note: In the updated Manual of Indulgences this prayer is found on page 98, #28, part II (4th Edition).

Image: The image is from the Wikipedia article on Purgatorio by Dante. The caption states: “Purgatorio, Canto II: Christian souls arrive singing, escorted by an angel.” The drawing is by Gustave Dore, Public Domain, U.S.A.

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AMERICAN DEMOCRACY’S SPIRITUAL CRISIS

“We are building a dictatorship of relativism that does not recognize anything as definitive and whose ultimate goal consists solely of one’s own ego and desires.” (Pope Benedict XVI)

“Modern man does not know what he is doing because he does not know what he is undoing” (G.K. Chesterton)

Daniel Bell, the famous Harvard sociologist who died in 2011, was deeply concerned about the type of country we would be living in if the religious dimension of society was eclipsed by secularism. In 1976, in somewhat prophetic words, he wrote: “Modern societies have substituted utopia for religion – utopia not as transcendental, but one to be realized through history…with the nutrients of technology….The real problem with modernity is the problem of belief. To use an unfashionable term, it is a spiritual crisis, since the new anchorages have proven illusory, and the old ones have become submerged. It is a situation which brings us back to nihilism; lacking a past or a future, there is only a void…What holds one to reality if one’s secular system of meanings proves to be an illusion? I will risk an unfashionable answer – the return of Western society to some conception of religion.”

Here in the United States we are witnessing our democratic form of government clamoring for life and vitality because it is detached and removed from its Christian heritage. We are witnessing first-hand what happens to a democracy that was so fortunately undergirded by Christian moral principles, when it then decides to abandon those moral principles and to replace them with a system of moral relativism masquerading as tolerance and pluralism. And we are beginning to wonder: can that democracy survive? And we see that the society our children are inheriting is a strangely different society than the one we grew up in; and one senses a painful paganism – really a materialism – permeating the whole country. The great Saint John Paul II saw this horrifying reality taking place in the Western world. Here is what he said in his very important encyclical, The Splendor of Truth:

“This is the risk of an alliance between democracy and ethical relativism, which would remove any sure moral reference point from political and social life, and on a deeper level make the acknowledgement of truth impossible. Indeed, “if there is no ultimate truth to guide and direct political activity, then ideas and convictions can easily be manipulated for reasons of power. As history demonstrates, a democracy without values easily turns into open or thinly disguised totalitarianism.” (from # 101)

This is happening folks, right now, right before our very eyes. The victims: most especially our kids, with profound desensitization to the spiritual life and to the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, i.e., the only true Kingdom. Our kids at least have a right to see what is transpiring, how they are being robbed of such a humanizing, transcendent force known as the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We are witnessing first-hand a massive loss of faith – virtually an apostasy. Do we realize what this loss of faith means to the future of our democracy?

In his classic work, Democracy in America, Alex de Tocqueville pointed out that the Christian faith of the American people was a great benefit to the success of their democracy. He said: “Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith.” One wonders what a modern day Tocqueville would have to say about the situation of our current democracy where Christians, more and more, are becoming second class citizens (think, for a moment, of the chilling effect on free speech for American Christians who are silenced out of fear of losing their jobs).

With paganism comes a loss of sacramental life, and with a loss of sacramental life comes a corresponding loss of salvation. “Ay, there’s the rub.” Indeed, with fewer baptisms will come a corresponding loss of supernatural life in society. The “free man’s worship of nothing” does not bode well for American democracy. One day you may wake up and suddenly realize that with your own children and grandchildren you are an eyewitness to the reemergence of your pagan line of descendants (after how many generations of Catholics who sacrificed so much so that your own progeny could inherit the priceless gift of faith?). Well, be consoled, at least they have really top notch cell phones!

And Jesus wept over Jerusalem.

Tom Mulcahy, J.D.

Reference. The edited quote from Daniel Bell is taken from his famous book, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, p.28. During a recent trip to Charlotte, North Carolina my wife took this picture of me at the Billy Graham Library. We agree with the message expressed in the poster.

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MANY PEOPLE ARE IGNORING GOD AND RISK THE LOSS OF ETERNAL LIFE

“…they have not opened their hearts to the truth in order to be saved” (2 Thes. 2:11)

Salvation in Christ is a most precious gift. Indeed, it is the greatest gift of all. Dear God, give us the grace to meditate on the magnitude of the gift of salvation merited by Jesus Christ.

Yet, here in the United States and Canada (and certainly in Europe, too) we are witnessing an unprecedented loss of faith. People who can look back at generations of Catholic ancestors who preserved the faith for them have now themselves become the very reemergence of that family’s pagan line of descendants. This loss of faith has enormous implications, and has even the momentum of a mass apostasy. It is worth contemplating what happens to a Christian nation, once blessed by the Gospel, which then rejects it?

Perhaps more often than a human being breathes in air for physical life God is sending each one of us actual graces to grow closer to Him. On God’s part He is doing everything possible to save us. Here is the great risk God allows: we can reject his many graces and perish. Jesus warns us of this risk on many occasions.

The great Saint Pope John Paul II, a man of very great wisdom, had some very important words to say about the radical possibility of a human being – endowed with a free will – rejecting God’s invitation to eternal life. In Dominum et Vivificantem Saint Pope John Paul II explains in sobering terms that the “radical refusal [of a person] to accept [the] forgiveness of sin” means that this person claims the right to “persist in evil” (46), despite the fact that the Holy Spirit has been sent to convince the world about sin and judgment. “Those who are converted,” says Saint John Paul II, “are led by the Holy Spirit out of the range of the judgment, and introduced into the righteousness of Christ….” (48). To reject the the convincing concerning sin which comes from the Holy Spirit, a human being is, in essence, rejecting the “redemptive power of Christ’s blood” (46).

If a human being is not led out of sin and into the redemption merited by Jesus Christ he “persists in evil” and thereby perishes. The Pope points out that man is tempted to falsify truth by the dark opposition of Satan and the “constant pressure on man to reject God….” (38). Having chosen to persist in evil the human being enters, upon his death, into a definite state of suffering called hell. Saint John Paul II explains:

“Man” perishes” when he loses “eternal life”. The opposite of salvation is not, therefore, only temporal suffering, any kind of suffering, but the definitive suffering: the loss of eternal life, being rejected by God, damnation. The only-begotten Son was given to humanity primarily to protect man against this definitive evil and against definitive suffering. In his salvific mission, the Son must therefore strike evil right at its transcendental roots from which it develops in human history. These transcendental roots of evil are grounded in sin and death: for they are at the basis of the loss of eternal life. The mission of the only-begotten Son consists in conquering sin and death. He conquers sin by his obedience unto death, and he overcomes death by his Resurrection” (no. 14, Encyclical Salvifici Doloris).

Is it possible to grow in holiness if we are not concerned for souls? Zeal for the salvation of souls is a hallmark characteristic of the Saints. The need for a new Evangelization could not be greater or more urgent.

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Image: Christ and the Young Rich Man by Heinrich Hoffman, 1889, Public Domain, U.S.A.

P.S. How much grace God sends to someone estranged from Him is not subject to precise theological formulation.The starting point is the Infinite Goodness of God who is generous to every soul. The great Saint Alphonsus de Ligouri quotes with approval Soto who said: “I am absolutely certain, and I believe that all the Holy Doctors who were worthy of the name were always most positive, that no one was ever deserted by God is this mortal life.” A more recent theologian, Father Garrigou-LaGrange says, “Christ’s humanity communicates to us from minute to minute the actual grace of the present moment, as the air we breathe continually enters our lungs. *** Outside the sacraments, this activity of the Savior transmits the lights of faith to unbelievers who do not resist it.” Finally, Father Faber states: “Figures could not put down the number of graces He has given and is hourly giving to us” (p. 142); Faber states that even a man in mortal sin, through faith and hope, receives “incessant crowds of…actual graces” (p. 250). At page 313 Faber states that “God is infinitely merciful to every soul,” and “no one ever has been lost…by surprise….” ( The Creator and the Creature, TAN).

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PURGATORY: POPE BENEDICT WONDERFULLY ELUCIDATES ITS NEW TESTAMENT BASIS

“For our God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:29)

In his encyclical on hope, Spe Salvi, Pope Benedict XVI does a wonderful job of demonstrating how 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 clearly supports the doctrine of Purgatory. It is interesting to note, as well, that Dr. Scott Hahn, a Protestant convert, mentioned this New Testament passage in 1 Corinthians as being decisive for him in accepting the Church’s teaching on Purgatory (he says, “I must admit that theologically and psychologically 1st Corinthians 3 basically sealed it up. It was all sewn up for me when I worked through this, praying, studying, pondering. I think it’s strong and clear.”).

Here is the text in question from 1 Corinthians 3:10-15.

By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames. (NIV)

Now I know this text can be difficult to figure out, but it really isn’t that complicated. Let’s imagine you were contracted to build a house. If you have built your house out of high quality materials like gold, silver and costly stones, a fire will not burn it down. But if you built your house out of inferior materials like wood, hay or straw, the house is going to burn down when tested by fire. Now, what about your spiritual house? Are the good works you’ve performed during your life in order to build your spiritual edifice – are these works going to withstand the fiery scrutiny on judgment day? Or have low quality and shabby materials marred the appearance of your spiritual edifice?

Now there are two things that can happen to you if you’re inside a burning house: you can either perish in the fire or escape outside to safety! In the latter instance, where you escape, the fire proves to be remedial or purifying. Your shoddy workmanship is consumed, but yet you escape and live. In the context of judgment, this image of a saving or purifying fire sounds a lot like Purgatory! And in the passage in question from 1 Corinthians 3, Saint Paul speaks of such a situation where the shoddy workmanship is burned up and yet the “the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames” (1 Corinthians 3:15).

The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible explains 1 Corinthians 3:15 in this manner:

“Some Christian workers, whose efforts are shabby and imperfect, will pass through God’s fiery judgment like a man who barely escapes a burning building with his life. This prelude to salvation will involve painful spiritual consequences, which, though severe, will spare them eternal damnation….Catholic tradition interprets Paul’s teaching in the light of Purgatory…a final stage of purification for those who are destined to heaven but depart from this life still burdened with venial sins or with an unpaid debt of temporal punishment incurred from past sins (i.e., mortal sins already forgiven but imperfectly repented of). Passing through fire is thus a spiritual process where souls are purged of residual selfishness and refined in God’s love (CCC 1030-32).” (Pages 288-89)

Here is the beautiful and profound way in which Pope Benedict explains in his encyclical, Spe Salvi, how 1 Corinthians 3 illuminates the Church’s teaching on Purgatory:

“Paul begins by saying that Christian life is built upon a common foundation: Jesus Christ. This foundation endures. If we have stood firm on this foundation and built our life upon it, we know that it cannot be taken away from us even in death. Then Paul continues: “Now if any one builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—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 3:12-15). In this text, it is in any case evident that our salvation can take different forms, that some of what is built may be burned down, that in order to be saved we personally have to pass through “fire” so as to become fully open to receiving God and able to take our place at the table of the eternal marriage-feast.

47. Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God. In this way the inter-relation between justice and grace also becomes clear: the way we live our lives is not immaterial, but our defilement does not stain us for ever if we have at least continued to reach out towards Christ, towards truth and towards love. Indeed, it has already been burned away through Christ’s Passion. At the moment of judgement we experience and we absorb the overwhelming power of his love over all the evil in the world and in ourselves. The pain of love becomes our salvation and our joy. It is clear that we cannot calculate the “duration” of this transforming burning in terms of the chronological measurements of this world. The transforming “moment” of this encounter eludes earthly time-reckoning—it is the heart’s time, it is the time of “passage” to communion with God in the Body of Christ. The judgement of God is hope, both because it is justice and because it is grace. If it were merely grace, making all earthly things cease to matter, God would still owe us an answer to the question about justice—the crucial question that we ask of history and of God. If it were merely justice, in the end it could bring only fear to us all. The incarnation of God in Christ has so closely linked the two together—judgement and grace—that justice is firmly established: we all work out our salvation “with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12). Nevertheless grace allows us all to hope, and to go trustfully to meet the Judge whom we know as our “advocate”, or parakletos (cf. 1 Jn 2:1).” (nos. 46-47, Purgatory specifically mentioned in no. 45 )

Historically, it is quite clear that the early Christians believed in a state of purification after death. We know, for example, that the Christians living in the catacombs in Rome inscribed prayers for the dead on the walls. In addition, prayers for the dead are contained in some of the earliest Christian writings. Another key proof text in scripture is 2 Maccabees 12:46, which states: “It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead that they may be loosed from their sins.” Obviously, we would not pray for the dead if they were already in heaven. Every Catholic Mass offered throughout the world includes prayers for the living and the dead, and there is an extraordinary list of Catholic saints who have experienced private revelations of purgatory, the most recent of which include Saint Padre Pio and Saint Faustina Kowalska (the saint of the Divine Mercy revelations). Finally, is there not in our hearts a God-given instinct to pray for the souls of the dead? In Letters to Malcolm C.S. Lewis makes mention of this instinct to pray for the dead:

“Of course I pray for the dead. The action is so spontaneous, so all but inevitable, that only the most compulsive theological case against it would deter me. And I hardly know how the rest of my prayers would survive if those for the dead were forbidden. At our age, the majority of those we love best are dead. What sort of intercourse with God could I have if what I love best were unmentionable to him? I believe in Purgatory.”

In addition to these reasons which demonstrate the reasonableness of the Church’s teaching on Purgatory, Catholics need to be aware of the strong support found in Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians (Chapter Three) for Purgatory and its purifying fires.

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Photo attribution: Pope Benedict XVI at a canonization Mass, October 17, 2010, by Kancelaria Prezydenta RP. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 only as published by the Free Software Foundation (as downloaded from the Wikipedia article on Pope Benedict XVI and incorporated by reference).

References: Pope Benedict XVI, Encyclical Spe Salvi; Ignatius Catholic Study Bible; Dr. Scott Hahn audio, “Purgatory: Holy Fire”; and Catholicism and Fundamentalism by Karl Keating.

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THE LIVING MYSTERIES OF THE ROSARY: A SOURCE OF PROFOUND MEDITATION

“Jesus belongs to us” (F.W. Faber)

The mysteries of Jesus’ life belong to us! He lived them for us and for our well-being. Jesus’ mysteries are “life-giving realities,” says Father Jacques Philippe, “for those who contemplate them in faith.” As Blessed Abbot Marmion has pointed out, “the mysteries of Jesus…are ours as much as they are His. It is an inexhaustible source of confidence for a soul that loves Jesus to know that [Jesus] unites her intimately to each of His mysteries.”

Meditating on the mysteries of Jesus’ life will thus bear much fruit for us. On this point Father Jacques Philippe quotes the great spiritual writer, Cardinal Berulle, who states:

“[t]hese mysteries …are past in certain circumstances, and they are lasting and are present and perpetual in a certain other way. They are past as regards their execution, but they are present as regards their virtue, and their virtue never passes away. So…the spirit, the state, the virtue, the merit of the mystery is always present….That obliges us to treat the things and mysteries pertaining to Jesus not as things which are past and dead, but as things living and present, from which we too have to harvest fruits which are present and eternal.” (59-60).

In his Apostolic Letter, The Rosary of the Virgin Mary, Saint John Paul II encourages us to live more profoundly by the rosary. Here is a prayer we may have first lisped at a very early age which now has the power to take us even deeper into the life of Christ. The Pope states:

“The Rosary mystically transports us to Mary’s side as she is busy watching over the human growth of Christ in the home of Nazareth. This enables her to train us and to mold us with the same care, until Christ is ‘fully formed’ in us (cf. Gal 4:19).” (#15)

Furthermore, as the Pope carefully points out, meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary has a profound anthropological significance:

“In the light of what has been said so far on the mysteries of Christ, it is not difficult to go deeper into this anthropological significance of the Rosary, which is far deeper than may appear at first sight. Anyone who contemplates Christ through the various stages of his life cannot fail to perceive in him the truth about man. This is the great affirmation of the Second Vatican Council which I have so often discussed in my own teaching since the Encyclical Letter Redemptor Hominis: “it is only in the mystery of the Word made flesh that the mystery of man is seen in its true light”.The Rosary helps to open up the way to this light. Following in the path of Christ, in whom man’s path is “recapitulated,” revealed and redeemed, believers come face to face with the image of the true man. Contemplating Christ’s birth, they learn of the sanctity of life; seeing the household of Nazareth, they learn the original truth of the family according to God’s plan; listening to the Master in the mysteries of his public ministry, they find the light which leads them to enter the Kingdom of God; and following him on the way to Calvary, they learn the meaning of salvific suffering. Finally, contemplating Christ and his Blessed Mother in glory, they see the goal towards which each of us is called, if we allow ourselves to be healed and transformed by the Holy Spirit. It could be said that each mystery of the Rosary, carefully meditated, sheds light on the mystery of man.” (#25)

Using meditation we learn to “live more profoundly by the rosary,” because we begin to enter more deeply into the redeeming mysteries of our Lord’s own life. We are not merely to chant, but we are to chant and meditate and ask Mary to help us see things about our Lord that deepen our understanding and love for Him. In this light, the Pope refers to the Rosary as an “exquisitely contemplative prayer.” He says:

“The Rosary, precisely because it starts with Mary’s own experience, is an exquisitely contemplative prayer. Without this contemplative dimension, it would lose its meaning, as Pope Paul VI clearly pointed out: ‘Without contemplation, the Rosary is a body without a soul, and its recitation runs the risk of becoming a mechanical repetition of formulas, in violation of the admonition of Christ: In praying do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think they will be heard for their many words’ (Mt 6:7). By its nature the recitation of the Rosary calls for a quiet rhythm and a lingering pace, helping the individual to meditate on the mysteries of the Lord’s life as seen through the eyes of her who was closest to the Lord. In this way the unfathomable riches of these mysteries are disclosed.” (#12)

The Pope makes two concrete suggestions to help us meditate more on the mysteries of the Rosary. The first suggestion by the Pope is to listen to the Biblical passage associated with each Rosary mystery. The Pope explains:

“In order to supply a Biblical foundation and greater depth to our meditation, it is helpful to follow the announcement of the mystery with the proclamation of a related Biblical passage, long or short, depending on the circumstances. No other words can ever match the efficacy of the inspired word. As we listen, we are certain that this is the word of God, spoken for today and spoken ‘for me’.

If received in this way, the word of God can become part of the Rosary’s methodology of repetition without giving rise to the ennui derived from the simple recollection of something already well known. It is not a matter of recalling information but of allowing God to speak. In certain solemn communal celebrations, this word can be appropriately illustrated by a brief commentary.” (#30)

The second suggestion of the Pope is to pause for a period of silence to focus attention on the mystery in question. The Pope says:

“Listening and meditation are nourished by silence. After the announcement of the mystery and the proclamation of the word, it is fitting to pause and focus one’s attention for a suitable period of time on the mystery concerned, before moving into vocal prayer. A discovery of the importance of silence is one of the secrets of practicing contemplation and meditation. One drawback of a society dominated by technology and the mass media is the fact that silence becomes increasingly difficult to achieve. Just as moments of silence are recommended in the Liturgy, so too in the recitation of the Rosary it is fitting to pause briefly after listening to the word of God, while the mind focuses on the content of a particular mystery.” (#31)

In addition to the two suggestions of the Pope, I am going to suggest another way to use the Rosary to deepen meditation, a method that may be more advisable when you are praying the Rosary alone and have ample time. It is permissible and even encouraged in meditation to use our imagination to enter a Bible scene one may be mediating on to adore the Lord (as in His Nativity), or to console the Lord (as during His Agony in the Garden), and ultimately to converse with the Lord in an intimate manner. Saint Teresa of Avila is adamant that meditation should lead to conversation (see, for example, Peter Thomas Rohrbach’s book, Conversation With Christ)! Thus, in the period of silence proposed by the Pope one could use his or her imagination to “enter into” the Rosary mystery in order to praise, adore or console the Lord, and then to talk to the Lord. As previously mentioned, these mysteries are “living and present” and contain particular fruit for each of us. Jesus came for each one of us: therefore, enter into the mystery, talk to Jesus, stay with Him for a while, share with Him His joys and sorrows, console Him, and let Him console you, and tell the Lord your problems and needs. Allow yourself to be present to the Lord in the mystery you are praying. You can then linger with the Lord in the mystery as you pray the Our Father and the ten Hail Marys. With practice, this method of praying the Rosary could deepen your level of intimacy with the Lord.

EXAMPLE: You come to the First Sorrowful Mystery, The Agony in the Garden. Per the recommendation of Saint Pope John Paul II, you read and listen to a Gospel account of our Lord’s Agony in the Garden, and then observe a period of silence to focus on the mystery. I am then recommending that you use your imagination to walk into the garden of Gethsemane to kneel next to Jesus, to look at Him, to console Him, and then to converse with Him. You might even put your arm around Him and tell Him of your own sorrow for the sins you have committed. Become a very dear friend of Jesus. Then pray the prayers for that decade with the mystery and your encounter with Jesus lingering in the background. You need not do this for every mystery, but it should prove fruitful if you can do it for one or two of the mysteries, depending upon how much time you have.

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Reference: In my opening sentence I am following Father Faber whose opening sentence in All for Jesus is “Jesus belongs to us.” Those first few pages of All for Jesus are well worth reading. Some books which discuss the role of imagination and conversation in Catholic meditation include: Time for God by Jacques Philippe and Progress through Mental Prayer by Edward Leen. I borrow from Father Garrigou-LaGrange the phrase, “living more profoundly.”

Image: The Virgin of the Rosary by Bartolome Esteban Murillo, around 1650-55, Public Domain, U.S.A.

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YOU ARE SURROUNDED BY A GREAT CLOUD OF WITNESSES: THE SAINTS!

“…we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses….” (Hebrews 12:1)

The New testament verse, set forth above, confirms the following four points:

1). We on earth

2). are surrounded

3). by a great cloud of witnesses

4). who are in Heaven.

Under the heading, “A Cloud of Witnesses,” Section 2683 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church says the following:

2683 The witnesses who have preceded us into the kingdom, especially those whom the Church recognizes as saints, share in the living tradition of prayer by the example of their lives, the transmission of their writings, and their prayer today. They contemplate God, praise him and constantly care for those whom they have left on earth. When they entered into the joy of their Master, they were “put in charge of many things.” Their intercession is their most exalted service to God’s plan. We can and should ask them to intercede for us and for the whole world.

The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible states:

“Images of the faithful departed [in Hebrews 12:1] cheering us on hints at the communion and intercession of the saints. It shows that the Church in heaven is neither cut off from nor disinterested in the pilgrim Church on earth but is actively solictious of her salvation.”

As we run the race of salvation (the metaphor used in Hebrews 12:1) it is comforting to know that there are a “huge” multitude of saints in Heaven who are “intensely interested” in us persevering to the end! “We can and should ask them to intercede for us and for the whole world” (CCC 2683).

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

P.S. Even a number of Protestant commentaries, in commenting on this verse, establish that, at a minimum, the Saints in Heaven are very interested in what is happening on earth. The picture above is based on Rev. 5:8, showing the Saints in Heaven bringing the prayers of the faithful to the Lord; it is entitled, Saint John on Patmos by the Limbourg brothers, around 1411, Public Domain, U.S.A.

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DO ALL CHRISTIANS BELIEVE IN PURGATORY?

(The Catacombs, where early Christians inscribed on the walls prayers for the dead)

“Our souls demand Purgatory, don’t they? Would it not break the heart if God said to us, ‘It is true, my son, that your breath smells and your rags drip with mud and slime, but we are charitable here and no one will upbraid you with these things, nor draw away from you. Enter into the joy’? Should we not reply, ‘With submission, sir, and if there is no objection, I’d rather be cleaned first.’ ‘It may hurt, you know’ – ‘Even so, sir.” (C.S.Lewis, Letters To Malcolm, chapter 20)

“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. The Church gives the name purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1030)

Believe it or not, all Christians do in fact believe in Purgatory. Let me show you why. We are told in the Letter to the Hebrews that no one can see the Lord without possessing holiness (Hebrews 12:14). This brings us to Larry and Jane Smith, husband and wife, who unfortunately died together in an automobile accident when Larry fell asleep at the wheel of his brand new Ford Explorer. Little did Larry and Jane know that they would meet the Lord on that fateful day. By way of background, Jane had been a very holy and devout Baptist who walked the straight and narrow path of the Lord. Moved by her love for Christ, she had led a holy and righteous life and had been very kind to the poor. The grace of God had certainly worked wonders in her life. On the other hand, Larry had been a habitual sinner. The three sins which had taken root in his soul were his love for pornography, his dishonest business practices and his hate for certain races. Fortunately for Larry, the one time he went with his wife to church he picked up a tract on the table and followed the directions which told him “How to be saved.” That day in church he repented of his sins and accepted Jesus Christ as his personal savior. He was saved.

For two days after being saved Larry actually managed to avoid committing a serious sin. But then the struggle became too much and he reverted back into the pattern of sin which had been routine in his life for many years. Then, as you know, he fell asleep at the wheel and died.

When the moment came for the book of Jane’s life to be laid out in front of the judgment seat of Christ, there was nothing but joy and contentment. Jane was pure and holy and Jesus was very pleased with the state of her soul. He gave to her a white linen garment to put on, representing the righteous deeds she had done during her life (see Revelation 19:81).

The moment for Larry’s judgment was not so joyful. Larry was so full of sin that he could not even look upon the Lord. When asked by Jesus what he had to say in his defense, Larry was smart enough to remind the Lord that he had been saved the day he repented of his sins and accepted Jesus Christ as his personal savior (since, for the purpose of this fictional story, Jesus is an Evangelical Protestant, Jesus responded to Larry by letting him know that Larry’s faith, as little as there was of it, had saved him). Jesus told Larry that he was free to walk through the gates of heaven.

But then something happened to Larry. As he started to walk through the gates of heaven, all of the saints and angels in heaven came forward and blocked Larry’s path. They shouted at Larry: “Even though you have been saved, you still stink of sin and our Lord has made it clear that you cannot enter into heaven until you are holy. You must be purified. You must be cleansed of your sin. We cannot have you enter heaven looking at the angels with lustful eyes or still hating races of people who were made in the image and likeness of God. You must be purged from your sin.” Larry said: “How is this to be done?” The angels and saints responded: “You must spend some time outside the gates of heaven doing penance for your sins and transforming your soul, with the aid of God’s grace, from a state of sin to a state of grace. Then, and only then, can you enter into the kingdom of heaven. Jesus has saved you from hell, but you are not worthy yet to enter the kingdom of God. Our God is a consuming fire (Deuteronomy 4:24; Hebrews 12:29), and until the fire of his love destroys all the sin within you, you must wait outside and become purified. Then, and only then, may you look upon the face of our holy God.”

Although to a Catholic Larry’s fate may well have been worse than Purgatory, the circumstances of his life and death underscore the absolute necessity for a state of purification prior to the glory of entering heaven. Even if you believe a person is saved by his faith alone in Jesus – irrespective of the conduct of his life – he cannot enter heaven in a defiled state. He must be purified of his sin. Therefore, unless you believe a person can somehow enter into heaven in an impure state, you do in fact believe in Purgatory.

Historically, it is quite clear that the early Christians believed in a state of purification after death. We know, for example, that the Christians living in the catacombs in Rome inscribed prayers for the dead on the walls. In addition, prayers for the dead are contained in some of the earliest Christian writings.* The key proof text in scripture is 2 Maccabees 12:46, which states: “It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead that they may be loosed from their sins.” Obviously, we would not pray for the dead if they were already in heaven. Every Catholic Mass offered throughout the world includes prayers for the living and the dead, and there is an extraordinary list of Catholic saints who have experienced private revelations of Purgatory, the most recent of which include Saint Padre Pio and Saint Faustina Kowalska (the saint of the Divine Mercy revelations). Finally, is there not in our hearts a God-given instinct to pray for the souls of the dead? In Letters to Malcolm C.S. Lewis makes mention of this instinct to pray for the dead:

In conclusion, scripture, common sense, Sacred Tradition and our natural desire to pray for the dead convince us that some of us may have to undergo a period of purgation before entering heaven, for we are told in the clearest Biblical terms, at Revelation 21:27, that —

“NOTHING UNCLEAN SHALL ENTER [HEAVEN]….”

Tom Mulcahy, M.A.

Image: A Procession in the Catacombs of Callistus by Alberto Pisa, 1905, Public Domain, U.S.A.

References: *See article at catholic.com, *”The Roots of Purgatory,” pertaining to the subject of early Christian writings and Purgatory. See also, Catholicism and Fundamentalism by Karl Keating. Finally, Pope Benedict XVI elaborates profoundly on the New Testament basis for Purgatory in his encyclical, Spe Salvi (sections 45-48), and I will be posting a note on that at some point.

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Catholic Strength

… growth in holiness… growth in well-being… growth in knowledge

Author: tomlirish

JESUS STRONGLY AND CLEARLY EMPHASIZES THE INDISSOLUBILITY OF MARRIAGE

“Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery” (Luke 16:18)

1. First and foremost let us look to the teaching of the Savior on Marriage and Divorce.

2. The teaching of Saint Paul

Seven Common Characteristics of the Saints

THE WORLD’S SHORTEST INDULGENCED PRAYER FOR THE SOULS IN PURGATORY

(Christian souls arrive in Purgatory singing and escorted by an angel, Canto II, Dante. Drawing by Gustave Dore)

“The faithful who apply indulgences as suffrages for the dead are practicing charity in a superior way and with their thoughts on the things of Heaven are dealing more virtuously with the things of earth.” (Apostolic Constitution on Indulgences)

WONDERFUL EFFECTS OF THIS DEVOTION

1. You begin to make the Sign of the Cross with awesome reverence knowing you are helping the poor souls;

2. In practicing this devotion you grow closer to the Trinity as you say their names with tenderness and love; and you remind yourself, in signing yourself with the cross, that the cross is the true wisdom of God, i.e., love entails sacrifice;

3. You give great glory to God because you assist Him in the ultimate goal of His love: bringing souls to Heaven to praise Him;

5. You grow in holiness since this prayer, which could have been made for your own welfare as an indulgence to reduce your time in Purgatory, is given in loving sacrifice as a suffrage to the poor souls;

6. You develop a habit of devotion that keeps your mind attuned to the supernatural operation of grace and to the goal of life: salvation! (and this is an attitude which acts as an antidote to worldliness – our arch enemy); and

AMERICAN DEMOCRACY’S SPIRITUAL CRISIS

MANY PEOPLE ARE IGNORING GOD AND RISK THE LOSS OF ETERNAL LIFE

“…they have not opened their hearts to the truth in order to be saved” (2 Thes. 2:11)

PURGATORY: POPE BENEDICT WONDERFULLY ELUCIDATES ITS NEW TESTAMENT BASIS

THE LIVING MYSTERIES OF THE ROSARY: A SOURCE OF PROFOUND MEDITATION

“Jesus belongs to us” (F.W. Faber)

YOU ARE SURROUNDED BY A GREAT CLOUD OF WITNESSES: THE SAINTS!

“…we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses….” (Hebrews 12:1)

DO ALL CHRISTIANS BELIEVE IN PURGATORY?

(The Catacombs, where early Christians inscribed on the walls prayers for the dead)

“Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery” (Luke 16:18)

1. First and foremost let us look to the teaching of the Savior on Marriage and Divorce.

2. The teaching of Saint Paul

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“The Eucharist is too great a gift to tolerate ambiguity and depreciation.” (Saint Pope John Paul II)

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“The faithful who apply indulgences as suffrages for the dead are practicing charity in a superior way and with their thoughts on the things of Heaven are dealing more virtuously with the things of earth.” (Apostolic Constitution on Indulgences)

WONDERFUL EFFECTS OF THIS DEVOTION

1. You begin to make the Sign of the Cross with awesome reverence knowing you are helping the poor souls;

2. In practicing this devotion you grow closer to the Trinity as you say their names with tenderness and love; and you remind yourself, in signing yourself with the cross, that the cross is the true wisdom of God, i.e., love entails sacrifice;

3. You give great glory to God because you assist Him in the ultimate goal of His love: bringing souls to Heaven to praise Him;

5. You grow in holiness since this prayer, which could have been made for your own welfare as an indulgence to reduce your time in Purgatory, is given in loving sacrifice as a suffrage to the poor souls;

6. You develop a habit of devotion that keeps your mind attuned to the supernatural operation of grace and to the goal of life: salvation! (and this is an attitude which acts as an antidote to worldliness – our arch enemy); and

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“…they have not opened their hearts to the truth in order to be saved” (2 Thes. 2:11)

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“Jesus belongs to us” (F.W. Faber)

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“…we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses….” (Hebrews 12:1)

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