How soon people go to heaven, purgatory or hell after death

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Polak

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A little fuzzy on this.

Is it correct that in the Catholic faith (and Christian faith more broadly possibly?) we believe that after death your soul is judged and goes to heaven, hell or purgatory quite quickly? By quickly I mean while the world is still spinning.

I would think this is the case because those who are in heaven can pray for us, we can pray for those in purgatory and of course, there are the visions people have had of hell, that I assume were not visions of what the future holds for some people, but actual glimpses of hell and people in it.

I do however remember hearing explanations in my childhood of how it works that were a little different, and am wondering if I might perhaps be remembering it wrong or if some Christian also believe this. It was basically along the lines that the dead will be raised when the end of the world happens and judged then. That seems to conflict with the other version though, doesn’t it?
 
I believe that at the moment of our deaths we are judge immediately. And we go to heaven, hell, or purgatory accordingly.

Then at the end of the world when Christ returns he will judge everyone at once who is left, and then we will get our resurrected physical bodies back if we are destined for heaven.

I think this is what church teaching is, but someone please correct me if I’m wrong.

It’s funny you posted this. When I was a child I believed the church taught we all wait rotting in the ground until Christ returns, but reading these forms had revealed to me that was wrong.
 
ZemD said:
and then we will get our resurrected physical bodies back if we are destined for heaven.
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What do you mean here? Those that are judged when the world ends (judgment day) will get their bodies back if they are destined for heaven? What about those who were judged a lot earlier and are already in heaven? Do they already have their bodies back? Or do they also get their bodies back when the world ends?
 
We don’t get our physical bodies back until Christ comes again. If we die before then our body waits here on earth and our soul goes to heaven or hell or purgatory. Everyone gets their body back at the end of the world, even those in hell.
 
Interesting. So those in hell are effectively just souls until they get their bodies back when the world ends. I wonder if that means they don’t feel any physical pain in the meantime? Of course it doesn’t mean they wouldn’t feel emotional pain (being away from God etc).
 
That is a good question. Someone smarter than myself can hopefully answer it for you!
 
Polak said:
Interesting. So those in hell are effectively just souls until they get their bodies back when the world ends. I wonder if that means they don’t feel any physical pain in the meantime? Of course it doesn’t mean they wouldn’t feel emotional pain (being away from God etc).
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I don’t think the pain in Hell is physical.

Modern Catholic Dictionary:

HELL. The place and state of eternal punishment for the fallen angels and human beings who die deliberately estranged from the love of God. There is a twofold punishment in hell: the pain of loss, which consists in the deprivation of the vision of God, and the pain of sense, which consists in the suffering caused by outside material things. The punishment of hell is eternal, as declared by Christ in his prediction of the last day (Matthew 25:46), and as defined by the Fourth Lateran Council, stating that the wicked will “receive a perpetual punishment with the devil” (Denzinger 801). The existence of hell is consistent with divine justice, since God respects human freedom and those who are lost actually condemn themselves by their resistance to the grace of God.

FIRE OF HELL. The physical reality, outside the person, by which those in hell are punished besides their loss of the vision of God. It is called fire in the Scriptures to emphasize the excruciating pain it causes, and to identify it as some external agent tormenting the lost. But it is not ordinary fire, since it does not consume what it burns, and, although material, it can affect the purely spiritual substance of the soul.
 
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The only predictable situation I know of is the one related to the scapular devotion.

If the person who dies meets all the requirements Our Lady stated, their soul will surely be in Heaven by the next Saturday (doesn’t matter if they died Monday or Friday).

Except from this, I have no clue… God and His angels and saints know. heh
 
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The Church infallibly teaches that if you die in a state of mortal sin you go immediately to Hell and if you die in a state of grace you are immediately saved (either straight to Heaven or Purgatory first and later to Heaven).
It does not matter what private revelations say it is only the Church teaching that counts.
 
Polak said:
A little fuzzy on this.

Is it correct that in the Catholic faith (and Christian faith more broadly possibly?) we believe that after death your soul is judged and goes to heaven, hell or purgatory quite quickly? By quickly I mean while the world is still spinning.

I would think this is the case because those who are in heaven can pray for us, we can pray for those in purgatory and of course, there are the visions people have had of hell, that I assume were not visions of what the future holds for some people, but actual glimpses of hell and people in it.

I do however remember hearing explanations in my childhood of how it works that were a little different, and am wondering if I might perhaps be remembering it wrong or if some Christian also believe this. It was basically along the lines that the dead will be raised when the end of the world happens and judged then. That seems to conflict with the other version though, doesn’t it?
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I highly recommend this book, it is very affordable and may even be free for download…it answers a lot of what you are asking.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
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