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What does a person in heaven need to be refreshed of?
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
Peace,
CM
I’m still not getting you.* What* did you learn about the “world to come”? How did it factor into your acceptance of a purgatory? I am assuming that you researched what the Jews meant by the “world to come” and you found evidence of purgatory. That would be the type of research that I would do and I did. I’m not an ex-Catholic because of it, but it factored into that which I realize the early church never taught or believed.
Peace,
CM
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
Peace,
CM
That’s not the point and I already explained this. The early Christians who did practice this didn’t pray for purgatorial alleviance but for a refreshing. Let me put this in more “Catholic” terms, they prayed that the soul would be refreshed in the sense as when they first caught the Beatific Vision. There is no need to try and read a purgatorial aspect to the “refreshing.” It just won’t work.
Peace,
CM
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E.E.N.S
Guest
Actually, I went more to the ECF than to the Jews myself, and I have to disagree with you, I found much evidence that the ECF believed in a “purgatory.”
Remember the parable of the mustard seed; the doctrine of purgatory developed along with understanding as well.
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I am not trying to read a “purgatory” into “refreshing,” I asked you what does a person in heaven need refreshing for?
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Incase you are wondering, my first “Catholic” purchase was The Faith of the Early Church Fathers by Jergens. (3 vol. set)
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Churchmouse
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Development isn’t the issue here. Anything can be developed if looked for hard enough. Let’s stick to the issue.
Cm
Well, you should be going to those who it applies to, namely, the Jews. They are the ones who understand the “olam ha-ba” (world to come" in the context that Jesus was speaking. Going to the Church Fathers isn’t going to explain this unless they are clearly citing Jewish belief. Tell me the ECF’s you’ve read that cite the Jewish belief in the world to come.
Development isn’t the issue here. Anything can be developed if looked for hard enough. Let’s stick to the issue.
Cm
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Churchmouse
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Peace,
CM
Well, I answered that in my prior post.
Peace,
CM
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E.E.N.S
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I went to the ECF because I wanted to know what they believed about Faith in general - I did not go to them for the purgatory issue alone (which never really was much of a concern of mine to begin with.)
You still haven’t aswered my question, CM, what does a person in heaven need refreshing for?
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
CM
Did you ever try reading the ECFs without the Catholic commentary. It seems to me that if one wants to be unbiased, read them in their naked glory without the commentary leading the way.
CM
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E.E.N.S
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How so?
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
The early Christians who did practice this didn’t pray for purgatorial alleviance but for a refreshing. Let me put this in more “Catholic” terms, they prayed that the soul would be refreshed in the sense as when they first caught the Beatific Vision. There is no need to try and read a purgatorial aspect to the “refreshing.” It just won’t work.
Peace,
CM
Nope! Don’t do that to me. I already answered that above. I will cut and paste it here again in case you didn’t get it:
The early Christians who did practice this didn’t pray for purgatorial alleviance but for a refreshing. Let me put this in more “Catholic” terms, they prayed that the soul would be refreshed in the sense as when they first caught the Beatific Vision. There is no need to try and read a purgatorial aspect to the “refreshing.” It just won’t work.
Peace,
CM
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E.E.N.S
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Ever Christian book store I went to had NOTHING on the ECF, then finally a nice elderly lady at one of the stores told me that I would have to go to a Catholic book store - that’s were I picked up the Jergens volumes.
And yes, I have read some of the ECF without ANY commentaries, it still seemed Catholic to me. (Which they were obviously.)
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E.E.N.S
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Perhaps I am dense…ellaborate for me a bit.
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Churchmouse
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CM
Then, please, point me to the ECF’s who influenced your view on the “world to come.”
CM
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Churchmouse
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Peace,
CM
I don’t know how much clearer it needs to get. All you need to know is that it wasn’t purgatorial and that “some” in the early church prayed that the souls of their loved ones would “re-experience” the “refreshing” they experienced when they first entered the kingdom. Is it clear now?
Peace,
CM
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Since I am at work I don’t have access to what I had originally used (and still use) - the before mentioned set by Jergens, I highly recommend it to anyone.
But there is a lot of decent links to the ECF writings (and not just the selective apologetical ones either)
try here if you are interested catholicfirst.com/churchfathersindex.cfm
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E.E.N.S
Guest
It’s not very clear (now you must know what I feel like when I am trying to explain something I view as simple to you) - are you saying that they believed that the best part of heaven is the very first glimpse of the Beatific Vision and that they prayed that this feeling would be renewed? (You probably aren’t but that’s what it sounds like you are saying.)
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
CM
It’s okay. Thanks for the link, but I have every Church Father you can imagine, neatly tucked in software and on my computer.
CM
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Churchmouse
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E.E.N.S.:
Peace,
CM
No, it is NOT the same thing and I’m really surprised that you would view it as so. On the one hand, you made a parallel which, to this day, remains unsubstantiated considering you never gave even “one” ECF or anything which upholds your parallel. Not a one. On the other hand, I am telling you that “historically” these prayers weren’t understood in any way, form, or manner "purgatorial by those praying them. It was understood to be a “refreshing” of those already in heaven. When I find the time, I am going to post the entire section on the “refrigerium” from Le Goff’s book.
Peace,
CM
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