Purgatory
What does purgatory have to do with abortion, or with childhood sexual abuse?
It appears that many Catholics think they can support abortion, spend time in purgatory to pay for it, then still go to heaven.
Wiki: In Catholic theology, purgatory (Latin: Purgatorium, via Anglo-Norman and Old French)
[1] is an intermediate state after physical death in which some of those ultimately destined for heaven must first "undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven," holding that "certain offenses can be forgiven in this age, but certain others in the age to come."
[2] And that entrance into Heaven requires the "remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven," for which indulgences may be given which remove "either part or all of the temporal punishment due to sin," such as an "unhealthy attachment" to sin.
[3] Only those who die in the state of grace but have not yet fulfilled the temporal punishment due to their sin can be in purgatory, and therefore, no one in purgatory will remain forever in that state nor go to hell.
The notion of purgatory is associated particularly with the Latin Church (in the Eastern Catholic churches it is a doctrine, though it is not often called purgatory, but the final purification or the final theosis). “(in Roman Catholic doctrine) a place or state of suffering inhabited by the souls of sinners who are expiating their sins before going to heaven.” (Wiki)
Is Purgatory a real place? I question the existence of purgatory as it is portrayed in Catholic doctrine.
That term isn’t used in the English New Testament.
We know there is a place that evil people go until the Judgment Day.
But as on the Judgment Day, ‘that place’ is emptied out into the eternal Lake of Fire,
and ‘that place’ becomes like an old woman’s uterus; once full to bursting, then it will be emptied and will atrophy.
Concerning a true Christian's destination after death, Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:8:
“We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord. 9 Wherefore we labor, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.”
Catholics have a problem with going to heaven immediately when they die.
As people who want to be good, we are such failures in daily life.
But here is the promise in 1 John 3:2:
“Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”
If we will instantly be like Him, then why do we need purgatory? Many of our sins come from our lack of knowledge of God.
We can never know God completely until we see Him.
For true Christians, the misperceptions we hold and the temptations we wrestle with, will dissolve when we see Jesus, at our death or at the Rapture.
Our minds will be instantly corrected when we see God for who He truly is, and we will instantly begin to think rightly,
and then we will be holy.
What does Catholic doctrine say about Catholics taken up in the Rapture. Do they also need purgatory?)
We don’t need purgatory to reform our minds. Christ's appearing does that, and Christ forgives truly repented sins instantly,
so purgatory is unnecessary for the truly repentant,
and is no help for those who die unrepentant.
Our relatives?
One of the great tragedies of humanity is that we don't go to heaven by family.
Some relatives make it, some don't.
Always by personal choice, often sad.
Yet some sects try to find a way where every loved one makes it to heaven.
It doesn't happen.
It seems strange that any church doctrine would say that Jesus can't save someone, they can't save themselves,
but some living person, supposedly bound for purgatory themselves,
can shorten someone else's time there by paying priests to pray for them.
It doesn't make sense.
If the point of purgatory is to burn off sins, how do the prayers of current sinners help the process,
and why shorten the burning process at all?
This Purgatory Doctrine is not consistent with what I believe I know about the character of God.
And again what about those caught up in the Rapture?
So, why does the doctrine of Purgatory exist?
True or False: Purgatory is a cash cow for any church that uses it.
Parishioners are held hostage trying to free loved ones, paying the church to have priests pray souls out of purgatory.
This sounds a lot like the sale of indulgences, which Martin Luther railed against 500 years ago.
Even more; I wonder how many extra sins and crimes have been committed, because some people reckon if they have to go to purgatory anyway,
they might as well make it worth it.
Perhaps this is why Pelosi, etc. and Catholic Governors like Grisham and Cuomo are conmfortable with kiling babies to get votes.
Crime Psychology can never be an exact science until we study how the Doctrine of Purgatory has affected crime in Western civilization.
What but purgatory can explain the horrors of Catholic abortion or child abuse by priests?
There is nothing in the New Testament that justifies either of these abuses.
Sorry to say this, but a lot of Catholics don’t know their Bible any better than they know the US Constitution.
Why bother having more than a 4th Grade education if we don’t read the two most important documents in American History?
Mary, mother of Jesus
Purgatory then, made it necessary to alter who Mary is, for how could the mother of Jesus need purification in purgatory?
Catholics make a bigger deal out of Mary than does the New Testament, which portrays Mary as an ordinary woman with a special mission.
Luke 1 has ‘Mary’s Song’: (in part here)
“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! For He has looked with favor on the humble state of His servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed. For the Mighty One has done great things for me. Holy is His name. His mercy extends to those who fear Him, from generation to generation….”
See the words, ‘my Savior’ and ‘mercy’? Sinless beings like angels Michael and Gabriel don’t need a Savior or mercy, for they’ve never sinned.
Only people who sin need a Savior, and only the repentant are eligible for mercy. Mary claimed to need a Savior, and seems to have claimed God’s mercy.
Certain followers of Christ have long tried to elevate Mary, mother of Jesus, above God's estimation of her.
Luke 11:
27
"As Jesus was saying these things, a woman in the crowd called out, “Blessed is the mother who gave you birth and nursed you.”
28 He replied, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”
So, what about the adoration of Mary and the worship of the Saints?
Mary was a mere mortal female.
John the Revelator, in Revelations 19, bowed down before the angel guiding him through this vision, and was soundly rebuked:
Revelation 19:9
"Then the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!” And he added, “These are the true words of God.” 10 At this I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, “Don’t do that! I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers and sisters who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God! For it is the Spirit of prophecy who bears testimony to Jesus.”
I suspect Mary and the Apostles are doing facepalms over the way some people idolize them.
Oh, and none of the saints that Catholics pray to, if they were US Citizens, alive today, would vote for pro-abortion candidates.
Yet, they would vote. Paul, for example, was proud of his Roman Citizenship.
The Immaculate Conception:
Q: What would it take for a white woman to have a black child?
A: A black man’s semen. That’s all.
Q: Then what would it take for a mere mortal female to conceive the Son of God?
A: God’s semen. That’s all.
Q: How did Mary get God’s semen?
A: Semen, water and wine are each made of nature’s basic building blocks; protons, electrons and neutrons.
Just as Jesus turned the water into wine by rearranging atoms and elements in the vessels at the wedding,
I believe God may have turned a teaspoon of Mary’s menstrual lining into Holy semen.
Q: Was it one sperm cell or millions?
A: I don’t know and it doesn’t matter. We have Jesus.
Eric J. Rose
teachustruth.com