SILLY QUESTION: Are partial indulgences collective or distributive?

[Sir_Knight]

It is said that partial indulgences remove part of the temporal punishment due to a soul due to sin. Is this a collective process or a distributive process?

For example, suppose I’m due 90 years in purgatory and I obtain a partial indulgence which removes one-third of the temporal punishment. Thus, that brings me down to 60 years.

Now suppose I do some more sinning and accumulative another 90 years in purgatory as temporal punishment thus bring my total to 150 (90 plus the previous 60) years.

Now, let’s says I obtain another partial indulgence which removes one-third of the temporal punishment. Is that collective and applies to the entire 150 years, thus bringing it down to 100 years or is it distributive and since the one-third was previously applied to the 60 years, the current partial indulgence only applies to the new 90 years, bringing it down to 60 years for a total of 120 years.

Collective : ((90 * 2/3) + 90) * 2/3 = 100 years

Distributive : (90 * 2/3) + (90 * 2/3) = 120 years.

 

[Chatter163]

This is why the Church no longer speaks of indulgence times in terms of specific numbers of years, but merely as partial or plenary.

 

[RobNY]

This assumes that indulgences erase the temporal penalty due to sin on a percentage basis. Perhaps they do. Perhaps they don’t. Maybe they remit an absolute amount and not a percentage. Maybe it’s a mix. Maybe some of them do one or the other. We don’t know. (And, if the partial basis works on percentages, then it would be impossible to eliminate purgatorial fire by partial indulgences, as reducing something by percentage could only make it perpetually smaller, but never zero.)

Sir Knight, as far as I know, an indulgence applies to all of the temporal penalties that you’ve accumulated due to sin. So, that indulgence applies equally to your collective penalties (i.e., get the sum total, and then apply indulgence). That would be my guess.

This is why the Church no longer speaks of indulgence times in terms of specific numbers of years, but merely as partial or plenary

I think Sir Knight is doing this to illuminate his idea, not to claim that he knows the literal length of his stay. In any case, when the Church spoke of indulgences in terms of time, they meant the amount of days of a certain work it was equivalent to, iirc.

 

[Dorothy]

Remember, there is no time in eternity, so it is misleading to talk about “years”.

We simply must just trust in the mercy of God to apply whatever he wills to our praying for indulgences.

 

[batteddy]

A plenary indulgence removes it all, but if you are not totally detatched from sin…then I believe that it remits a percentage of your total punishment based on how detatched from your sin you are (if you are 100% detatched it remits 100%, if you are 90% detatched, it remits 90% etc)

However, partial indulgences, I believe…are not based on a percent of sin and temporal punishment…but on an absolute amount. If you have “100 temperal punishment points” one day, and “900 temporal punishment points” on another, and do the same indulgenced act with the same fervor and dedication…I believe it will not remit a percentage…but a number of “points”, like “50”…so if you had 100, it would be down to 50, and if you had 900, it would be down to 850…

This must be the case, because if partial indulgences were done by percent…the same act at the same level of devotion would remit MORE punishment for someone who has acquired MORE temporal punishment…the same prayer would remit only 1 point for someone who only has 3 points acquired…but 10000 for someone who has 30000 acquired…which hardly seems fair.

So, in summary, I believe plenary indulgences remit a percent based on how detatched from sin you are…but partial remit an absolute amount.

This is why the Church no longer speaks of indulgence times in terms of specific numbers of years, but merely as partial or plenary

Yes and no.

The Church used to say what absolute amount a partial indulgence remitted by having a scale of “days and years”. But this was never meant to be a number of years in purgatory, which is outside time, but rather a comparison to how many days of Ancient Public Canonical Penance the act was equivalent too, at that same level of devotion. Something worth 3 years was not 3 years out of purgatory…but whatever absolute amount 3 years of ancient public penance would remit if preformed at the same level of devotion as the current indulged act.

However, the Church still does need to set what absolute amount a partial indulgence is worth and it still does. Because a partial indulgence is an absolute amount, while a plenary, I believe, is a percent proportionally based on how much you are detatched from sin.

The Enchiridion of Indulgences says:

“The faithful, who at least with contrite heart perform an action to which a partial indulgence is attached, obtain, in addition to the remission of temporal punishment acquired by the action itself, an equal remission of punishment through the intervention of the Church.”

That is the statement of how much, absolutely, a Partial Indulgence is worth these days.

Every act has an intrinsic moral value which remits temporal punishment whether it is indulged or not. ie, “works of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving which remit a multitude of sins”…

An indulged act used to remit the following:

The intrinsic worth of the act at that level of devotion PLUS the intrinsic worth of the number of days of ancient public penance at that level of devotion.

Nowadays, for better or worse, the Church merely remits:

The intrinsic worth of the act at that level of devotion PLUS “an equal remission of punishment through the intervention of the Church”

So nowadays, when you preform a partially indulged work…you recieve double the absolute amount it would be worth if it were not indulged. The Church “matches your grant” as it were, giving an “equal remission of punishment through the intervention of the Church”

This has pros and cons. The pros include a less confusing way of giving indulgences, not having to attatch a certain number of days, not having people think these were “days in purgatory”, and encouraging people to get more Plenary indulgences. The con is that you can only ever recieve twice the intrinsic worth of the act. One prayer is only worth 2 prayers, whereas in the old days and years system…the Church might make 1 prayer worth as much as thousands of prayers. But this is all the more incentive to get Plenary indulgences and detatch yourself from sin, instead of just trying to hoard as many days and years as possible, which people used to do.

 

[Sir_Knight]

Dorothy:

Remember, there is no time in eternity, so it is misleading to talk about “years”.

Purgatory does not exist in eternity; it exists in time (source). When the end comes and time no longer exists, neither will purgatory.

 

[Sir_Knight]

batteddy:

A plenary indulgence removes it all, but if you are not totally detatched from sin…then I believe that it remits a percentage of your total punishment based on how detatched from your sin you are (if you are 100% detatched it remits 100%, if you are 90% detatched, it remits 90% etc)

However, partial indulgences, I believe…are not based on a percent of sin and temporal punishment…but on an absolute amount. If you have “100 temperal punishment points” one day, and “900 temporal punishment points” on another, and do the same indulgenced act with the same fervor and dedication…I believe it will not remit a percentage…but a number of “points”, like “50”…so if you had 100, it would be down to 50, and if you had 900, it would be down to 850…

This must be the case, because if partial indulgences were done by percent…the same act at the same level of devotion would remit MORE punishment for someone who has acquired MORE temporal punishment…the same prayer would remit only 1 point for someone who only has 3 points acquired…but 10000 for someone who has 30000 acquired…which hardly seems fair.

So, in summary, I believe plenary indulgences remit a percent based on how detatched from sin you are…but partial remit an absolute amount.

But then the plenary indulgence would still use the same percentage system which you said was unfair for the partial indulgence because two people performing the same devotion and having the same attachment to sin would MORE punishment for someone who has acquired MORE temporal punishment…the same prayer would remit only 1 point for someone who only has 3 points acquired and had a 2/3 attachment to sin…but 10000 for someone who has 30000 acquired and had the same attachment level. If that approach is not fair for the partial indulgence, then it would be equally unfair for the plenary indulgence. Yes? No?

 

[Dorothy]

Sir Knight:

Purgatory does not exist in eternity; it exists in time (source). When the end comes and time no longer exists, neither will purgatory.

Interesting, I had never heard that before and will have to research more in order to understand better.

 

[Sir_Knight]

Don’t feel bad – I was under the same mistaken belief as you until it was pointed out to me.

 

[CatQuilt]

Dorothy:

Interesting, I had never heard that before and will have to research more in order to understand better.

That’s why I love coming here…I always learn something new…

 

[batteddy]

If that approach is not fair for the partial indulgence, then it would be equally unfair for the plenary indulgence. Yes? No?

Yes and no. Its not really “unfair” either for partial or plenary indulgences, I should not have said…the mercy of the Church and God is generous and we should not question the person who recieves the same payment even though we have been working since sun-up and they have only been working since an hour before sun-down.

Nevertheless, I believe that is just the way it works. The Church seems to attatch an absolute remission to partial indulgences, but a proportional remission to plenary indulgences.

This can be shown by the fact that the Church used to speak of attatching a certain number of days of the value of ancient public penance to partial indulgences…indicating an absolute value, namely the intrinsic worth of the ancient public penance.

Also, the Church nowadays speaks of remitting an amount equal to the intrinsic worth of the action itself, which sounds more absolute even if it could be imagined as also being multiplicative instead of additive, the language of the Church does not seem to indicate that.

With plenary indulgences, however, it never spoke of discreet, absolute amounts like “days”…but rather a proportion of the punishment, namely “all” the punishment. But then it says that if one is not totally detatched from sin, it becomes a partial indulgence, the value of which it seems to indicate is based on how much one is in fact detatched from sin.

Its like a sale in a store. A coupon for $5 off is going to be just as helpful as a coupon for 50% percent off on a $10 item…but on a $500 dollar item you’ll be glad to have the 50%.

But neither is really “fair” or “unfair”…the store is being generous by having the sale at all.

I just believe, from what I can tell, the Church gives both types of coupons. Partial based on an absolute amount: an amount equal to the intrinsic worth of the action, and Plenary based on a proportional amount: the percent detatched from sin (ideally 100% which is why they are called plenary)

 

[Sir_Knight]

Thank you.