Does Purgatory Really Exist?

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2 Corinthians 1:20-24

20 For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us. 21 Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; 22 Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. 23 Moreover I call God for a record upon my soul, that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth. 24 Not for that we have dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your joy: for by faith ye stand.

Ephesians 1:12-14

12 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ. 13 In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, 14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
Ephesians 4:30

30 And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.

John 1:10-18
10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. 11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not. 12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: 13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. 14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

1 Peter 1:18-23
18 Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; 19 But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot: 20 Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, 21 Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God. 22 Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently: 23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.

1 Peter 1:3-6
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundanta mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you**(“http://forums.catholic-questions.org/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=659391#_ftnIDADQXJE”), 5 Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
6 Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations:
 
Some non-Catholics, (and Catholics for that matter), get the idea that purgatory is a place of punishment. That is not the Church teaching! Purgatory is a process of final purification. It’s a good thing! Be not afraid. 🙂

If this has already been stated on this thread, I apologize.

Blessings to all.
 
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Mickey:
Some non-Catholics, (and Catholics for that matter), get the idea that purgatory is a place of punishment. That is not the Church teaching! Purgatory is a process of final purification. It’s a good thing! Be not afraid. 🙂

If this has already been stated on this thread, I apologize.

Blessings to all.
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If so, not clearly enough. I read several posts, then spot-checked the rest.

Purgatory is where the kid pulls the thorn out of the lion’s paw. After pain caused by original sin through your life, one second of a pinch and you can heal.

Purgatory is where we go to let the Holy Spirit finish pulling the plank out of our own eye. I think it might go easier if we start here on earth. Maybe by then it will only be a splinter.

Purgatory is pulling one of my own’s children’s teeth. As a dad, I get to tell them what it will be like to allay their fears, then carry it out competently and gain their confidence. God is pulling out our baby teeth (carnal body) so the permanent ones have a place to come in. They know they can trust me to tell them the truth when I tell them the pain of this moment in this age is nothing compared to the glory of What Comes Upon Purification.

Gosh, I could make up more of these but I don’t know whether this is profound or just silly, so I’ll limit it here.

It’s a scary place, going into it, but we have faith the Holy Spirit will prepare us for unity with the Father. Maybe it completes the process we began when we were born of the spirit; Christ commanded us to be transformed, but as the Way, He can shine Light on higher Truth that brings us to perfection once the limitations of our wordly body are left behind – thereby allowing non-perfect humans to dress for the feast.

Alan
 
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AlanFromWichita:
If so, not clearly enough. I read several posts, then spot-checked the rest.

Purgatory is where the kid pulls the thorn out of the lion’s paw. After pain caused by original sin through your life, one second of a pinch and you can heal.

Purgatory is where we go to let the Holy Spirit finish pulling the plank out of our own eye. I think it might go easier if we start here on earth. Maybe by then it will only be a splinter.

Purgatory is pulling one of my own’s children’s teeth. As a dad, I get to tell them what it will be like to allay their fears, then carry it out competently and gain their confidence. God is pulling out our baby teeth (carnal body) so the permanent ones have a place to come in. They know they can trust me to tell them the truth when I tell them the pain of this moment in this age is nothing compared to the glory of What Comes Upon Purification.

Gosh, I could make up more of these but I don’t know whether this is profound or just silly, so I’ll limit it here.

It’s a scary place, going into it, but we have faith the Holy Spirit will prepare us for unity with the Father. Maybe it completes the process we began when we were born of the spirit; Christ commanded us to be transformed, but as the Way, He can shine Light on higher Truth that brings us to perfection once the limitations of our wordly body are left behind – thereby allowing non-perfect humans to dress for the feast.

Alan
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AMEN!!!
smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/8/8_3_15.gif
 
Thank you for making the point more clearly that purgatory is not about earning our way to heaven through our suffering.

It’s a point that needed to be clarified.

CARose
 
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CARose:
Thank you for making the point more clearly that purgatory is not about earning our way to heaven through our suffering.

It’s a point that needed to be clarified.

CARose
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Now that you put it right out there like that, I think I’ve often heard it visualized the other way. “The poor suffering souls in purgatory” and stuff like that. You’d think they had big men swinging a cat-of-9-tails at them and saying, “lie to your mother, eh? You need to taste of the pain you caused Christ.” :tsktsk:

Gee whiz, I’m getting grandiose. That reminds me to go take my meds. :whacky:

For that matter, maybe Purgatory is like that. I really don’t know; I just have almost enough faith that my hunger for Christ will lead me to all I need.

Alan
 
It might help our protestant brothers and sisters in Christ to appreciate purgatory by understanding it as our “final sanctification.” Sanctification is an important part of God’s plan for salvation. The following verses of scripture demonstrate the importance of sanctification for our salvation.

Heb 13:12
Therefore Jesus also suffered outside the city gate in order to sanctify the people by his own blood.

Acts 20:32
And now I commend you to God and to the message of his grace, a message that is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all who are sanctified.

1Cor 1:2
To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

Rom 6:22
But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life.

Heb 2:11
For the one who sanctifies and those who are **sanctified ** all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters,

HEB 10:9
And it is by God’s will that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Heb 10:29
How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by those who have spurned the Son of God, profaned the blood of the covenant by which they were sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace?

1Peter 1:2
who have been chosen and destined by God the Father and sanctified by the Spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ and to be sprinkled with his blood:

Clearly, sanctification is not completely separate from justification, and it is an on going process within the Christian. I can give verses that will demonstrate that sanctification and salvation are spoken of in the past, present, and future tenses in scripture. Moreover, scripture tells us that Abraham was justified on at least three separate ocassions. Purgatory has been a belief from the earliest times and was never denied until the Reformation. Sanctification is something that is necessary as part of our salvation. It is our sanctification wrought by God’s grace in us through the suffering of Jesus that enables the author of Hebrews to mention among those in heaven “the spirits of just men made perfect.”[Heb 12:23]. It is our final sanctification that makes us clean and fit to enter heaven.[Rev 21:27]

When looked at in this light, purgatory is imperative.
 
I think it is difficult to accept that Sanctification is a Process rather than as a single moment in time for those who have grown up believing otherwise. It suddenly changes the equation and makes us more responsible for our actions. Certainly this is something that God would desire, that we take responsibility for what we do and how it affects those around us.

Scripture, as you have so aptly pointed out, makes this point clearly. Thanks for providing the citations.

CARose
 
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Mickey:
Some non-Catholics, (and Catholics for that matter), get the idea that purgatory is a place of punishment. That is not the Church teaching! Purgatory is a process of final purification. It’s a good thing! Be not afraid. 🙂

If this has already been stated on this thread, I apologize.

Blessings to all.
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Mikey-
If it is such a good thing, why did people in the 16th century see fit to attempt to buy their way out of it? Why also did corrupt members of the body attempt to sell alms or indulgences as a “way out” if it was indeed “something good”?

Doesn’t seem to make sense.
 
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ScottH:
Mikey-
If it is such a good thing, why did people in the 16th century see fit to attempt to buy their way out of it? Why also did corrupt members of the body attempt to sell alms or indulgences as a “way out” if it was indeed “something good”?

Doesn’t seem to make sense.
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Because human nature is weak and prone to sin. That seems pretty obvious to me. Why does a child refuse to take its medicine when his father tells him it will make him better? The perception is that it tastes bad and is generally unpleasant. So it goes with purgatory - to the best of our understanding from Scripture and Tradition.
 
After re-reading the posts here I began to wonder if there is more to Purgatory than “purging” the effects of sin.

Aren’t there moments when we do the right thing for the wrong reasons? Like when someone asks for help and we help them, but the motivation for helping is: now they’ll “owe you one”. Not Christ-like, but not necessarily sinful either. Or spontaneous emotions? Or the annoying co-worker or relative whom, with your imagination; visualize duct-taping into silence. How about those times in our lives when we’ve been under stress or ill and inadvertently become impatient with people or short tempered?

I guess my point is this: that Purgatory also purges us of character flaws; while not necessarily sinful are not Christ-like either.

Does this make sense?
 
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Wildgraywolf:
After re-reading the posts here I began to wonder if there is more to Purgatory than “purging” the effects of sin.
…
I guess my point is this: that Purgatory also purges us of character flaws; while not necessarily sinful are not Christ-like either.

Does this make sense?
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Makes good sense to me and is consistant with my understanding.

CARose
 
Hmmmmmmmmmm…interesting. I just got a free book by the Billy Graham website and it was that 100 Common questions on the Bible, God, and all that and as I was flipping through it, the question about Purgatory caught my eye and it said something like, “…there is good news for believers. Purgatory does not exist…” and that’s when I shut the book and thought, I’ll give this book to my parents.
 
Purgatory should be looked at the same way we view sanctification. Our sanctification is not always comfortable and easy. This is clear from the following verse of scripture although there are others that say something similar:

Heb 12:6
For the Lord disciplines him whom he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives."

Sanctification and Purgatory are uncomfortable in the sense that we must be separated from our attachments to sin. Our former sinful desires and inclinations are purged. This while good and holy is not always easy. In the end there is always great joy in being released from all attachment to sin. The most painful thing about purgatory is the temporary separation from the intimate face to face vision and communication with God that is enjoyed in heaven.
 
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