Still confused about indulgences

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I always thought that if I died immediately after going to confession and doing my penance that I would go right to Heaven without needing Purgatory. But as I try to understand indulgences, I read that:

“An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain defined conditions through the Church’s help when, as a minister of redemption, she dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions won by Christ and the saints” (Indulgentiarum Doctrina 1)."

This seems to say that, although my sins have been forgiven in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, I can still be punished for them. Is this because the penance I was given in confession wasn’t enough to cover the temporal punishment I am due? Am I going to need Purgatory to pay for the temporal punishment even if I die right after confession? Why isn’t the Sacrament itself enough of an “indulgence?”

I just can’t seem to get a firm grasp on indulgences no matter how much I read about them. I’m missing something, but I don’t know what it is. I want to be able to explain indulgences to my Protestant friends, but I cant make sense of them myself.
 
(The way I understand it is) Penance may not remove all temporal punishment. Therefore you still may need to spend time in Purgatory.

(To all:) Feel free to correct me
 
A mortal sin has a double consequence, the eternal aspect and the temporal aspect. The second is not always removed by the sacrament. The punishment is not an external imposition, though, it is a natural consequence that flows from your choices to sin. Here are two CCC paragraphs that you may find helpful:**1473 **The forgiveness of sin and restoration of communion with God entail the remission of the eternal punishment of sin, but temporal punishment of sin remains. While patiently bearing sufferings and trials of all kinds and, when the day comes, serenely facing death, the Christian must strive to accept this temporal punishment of sin as a grace. He should strive by works of mercy and charity, as well as by prayer and the various practices of penance, to put off completely the “old man” and to put on the “new man.”
**1472 **To understand this doctrine and practice of the Church, it is necessary to understand that sin has a double consequence. Grave sin deprives us of communion with God and therefore makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the “eternal punishment” of sin. On the other hand every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth, or after death in the state called Purgatory. This purification frees one from what is called the “temporal punishment” of sin. These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain.
Note that it can be removed by fervent charity. It does not always require Purgatory or indulgences.
 
Some profound words from Pope Benedict XVI on Purgatory

"46. Yet we know from experience that neither case is normal in human life. For the great majority of people—we may suppose—there remains in the depths of their being an ultimate interior openness to truth, to love, to God. In the concrete choices of life, however, it is covered over by ever new compromises with evil—much filth covers purity, but the thirst for purity remains and it still constantly re-emerges from all that is base and remains present in the soul. What happens to such individuals when they appear before the Judge? Will all the impurity they have amassed through life suddenly cease to matter? What else might occur? Saint Paul, in his First Letter to the Corinthians, gives us an idea of the differing impact of God’s judgement according to each person’s particular circumstances. He does this using images which in some way try to express the invisible, without it being possible for us to conceptualize these images—simply because we can neither see into the world beyond death nor do we have any experience of it. Paul begins by saying that Christian life is built upon a common foundation: Jesus Christ. This foundation endures. If we have stood firm on this foundation and built our life upon it, we know that it cannot be taken away from us even in death. Then Paul continues: “Now if any one builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each man’s work will become manifest; for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work which any man has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire” (1 Cor 3:12-15). In this text, it is in any case evident that our salvation can take different forms, that some of what is built may be burned down, that in order to be saved we personally have to pass through “fire” so as to become fully open to receiving God and able to take our place at the table of the eternal marriage-feast.
  1. Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God. In this way the inter-relation between justice and grace also becomes clear: the way we live our lives is not immaterial, but our defilement does not stain us for ever if we have at least continued to reach out towards Christ, towards truth and towards love. Indeed, it has already been burned away through Christ’s Passion. At the moment of judgement we experience and we absorb the overwhelming power of his love over all the evil in the world and in ourselves. The pain of love becomes our salvation and our joy. It is clear that we cannot calculate the “duration” of this transforming burning in terms of the chronological measurements of this world. The transforming “moment” of this encounter eludes earthly time-reckoning—it is the heart’s time, it is the time of “passage” to communion with God in the Body of Christ[39]. The judgement of God is hope, both because it is justice and because it is grace. If it were merely grace, making all earthly things cease to matter, God would still owe us an answer to the question about justice—the crucial question that we ask of history and of God. If it were merely justice, in the end it could bring only fear to us all. The incarnation of God in Christ has so closely linked the two together—judgement and grace—that justice is firmly established: we all work out our salvation “with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12). Nevertheless grace allows us all to hope, and to go trustfully to meet the Judge whom we know as our “advocate”, or parakletos (cf. 1 Jn 2:1). "
From Spe Salvi -Pope Benedict XVI

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20071130_spe-salvi_en.html

(PS He is among those theologians as Card. Ratzinger)
 
Bookcat said:
Some profound words from Pope Benedict XVI on Purgatory
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Great! More beautiful stuff from Pope Benedict. I like this statement from your quote:
" that in order to be saved we personally have to pass through “fire” so as to become fully open to receiving God and able to take our place at the table of the eternal marriage-feast."
God must be after the development or formation of our wills., for us to “become fully open to receiving God”. It seems to me that the primary injustice of Adam & Eves’ original sin is that they willfully rejected the will of God, favoring their own over His, and fell as a result. We must willfully rise again, with Gods help. And once we do, finally freely loving Him with our whole heart, soul, mind, and strength, then our justice is complete; we’ve received Him, we’re capable of “seeing” Him.

Also, at the end of the last paragraph, the Pope linked grace and justice in such a way as to reconcile them. Grace can’t operate without justice, as some versions of the “faith alone” doctrine seem to claim. God doesn’t simply forgive and not also expect change in us-new hearts. We’re forgiven, but then we’re also to “go, and sin no more”. And it makes sense to me that Purgatory, if necessary, is that “place” where we’re finally convinced that nothing other than God can satisfy us, nothing in creation can be greater than Him, sin (opposition to His will) offers nothing better than His will.
 
  1. Sin results in guilt and punishment
  2. Punishments are both temperal and eternal.
  3. Temperal penalties may remain when a sin is forgiven.
  4. God blesses some people as a reward to others
  5. God remits temperal penalties suffered by some as a reward to others.
  • This is the kicker 1Kings11:11-13. God was clear Solomon’s kingdom was not torn down not for Solomons sake but for the sake of David. If David had not pleased God. God would have removed the entire kingdom.
    There are other examples. God promised Abraham that if he could find a certain number of righteous men in Sodom he was willing to defer the city’s destruction for the sake of the righteous.
Do remember there is a difference in temperal salvation and eternal salvation. We can’t earn someones eternal salvation Christ did that! Indulgences only have to do with the temperal aspects of sin
 
TommyWommy said:
I always thought that if I died immediately after going to confession and doing my penance that I would go right to Heaven without needing Purgatory. But as I try to understand indulgences, I read that:

“An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain defined conditions through the Church’s help when, as a minister of redemption, she dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions won by Christ and the saints” (Indulgentiarum Doctrina 1)."

This seems to say that, although my sins have been forgiven in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, I can still be punished for them. Is this because the penance I was given in confession wasn’t enough to cover the temporal punishment I am due? Am I going to need Purgatory to pay for the temporal punishment even if I die right after confession? Why isn’t the Sacrament itself enough of an “indulgence?”

I just can’t seem to get a firm grasp on indulgences no matter how much I read about them. I’m missing something, but I don’t know what it is. I want to be able to explain indulgences to my Protestant friends, but I cant make sense of them myself.
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The illustration that seems to work best for my Protestant family and friends is this:
Are you perfectly holy right now? No.
When you are perfectly united with Christ in Heaven will you you be perfect holy? Yes.

We sue the word purgatory do describe the process by which, though we are not holy now, we will be perfectly holy and united with Christ in heaven.

They seem to be able to grasp this.
 
Thank you all. I have found all of your responses to be very helpful. 🙂
 
I always think of Purgatory as getting used to looking at Jesus in the eye without shame
 
St. Thomas Aquinas said that Purgatory is worse than any suffering we can imagine on earth.

Here are quotes from his Summa Theologica -

QUOTE " It is said (2 Maccabees 12:46): “It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.”
Now there is no need to pray for the dead who are in heaven, for they are in no need; nor again for those who are in hell, because they cannot be loosed from sins.
Therefore after this life, there are some not yet loosed from sins, who can be loosed there from; and the like have charity, without which sins cannot be loosed, for “charity covereth all sins” [Proverbs 10:12].
Hence they will not be consigned to everlasting death, since “he that liveth and believeth in Me, shall not die for ever” [John 11:26]: nor will they obtain glory without being cleansed,
because nothing unclean shall obtain it, as stated in the last chapter of the Apocalypse (verse 14).
Therefore some kind of cleansing remains after this life.

Further, Gregory of Nyssa [De iis qui in fide dormiunt] says: “If one who loves and believes in Christ,” has failed to wash away his sins in this life, “he is set free after death by the fire of Purgatory.” Therefore there remains some kind of cleansing after this life.

I answer that, From the conclusions we have drawn above (III, 86, 4-5; Supplement, 12, 1) it is sufficiently clear that there is a Purgatory after this life.
For if the debt of punishment is not paid in full after the stain of sin has been washed away by contrition, nor again are venial sins always removed when mortal sins are remitted, and if justice demands that sin be set in order by due punishment, it follows that one who after contrition for his fault and after being absolved, dies before making due satisfaction, is punished after this life.
Wherefore those who deny Purgatory speak against the justice of God: for which reason such a statement is erroneous and contrary to faith. Hence Gregory of Nyssa, after the words quoted above, adds: “This we preach, holding to the teaching of truth, and this is our belief; this the universal Church holds, by praying for the dead that they may be loosed from sins.”
This cannot be understood except as referring to Purgatory: and whosoever resists the authority of the Church, incurs the note of heresy. " UNQUOTE

There are paragraphs in the Diary of St. Faustina where some who died and went to Purgatory and were suffering who asked for her Prayers.

We can obtain indulgences for ourselves (no other living person), and the deceased.

Two good and complimentary books on the requirements for and obtaining indulgences are: - - -
“A Modern Guide to Indulgences” by Edward Peters, a canon lawyer with the forward written by Abp Timothy Dolan. The book has a Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur. It was published in 2008.
On the back there is a quote from Jimmy Akin Director of Apologetics and Evangilization at Catholic Answers. - " Dr Peters has produced an invaluable book clarifying one of the most misunderstood subjects in the Church today; indulgences. His explanation of the subject is informative, balanced, and spiritually enriching. This is must reading. "

and

“Manual of Indulgences” printed by the USCCB in 2006. It is from the Apostolic Penitentiary - Enchiridion Indulgentiarum. It lists all the Partial and Plenary Indulgences possible today, along with the requirements.
 
Have Masses stipend for the living and in purgatory. " Better a candle lit before you than behind you in this journey "
 
I think CS Lewis, as usual, has some of the plainest explanations for our day. Though he never ‘crossed the Tiber’ from Anglicanism, he really seems to be about as Catholic as they come; in the words of my brother, a Saint and Doctor of the Church.

Anyway, here’s his take:
The right view returns magnificently in Newman’s DREAM. There, if I remember it rightly, the saved soul, at the very foot of the throne, begs to be taken away and cleansed. It cannot bear for a moment longer ‘With its darkness to affront that light’. Religion has claimed Purgatory.
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Our souls demand Purgatory, don’t they? Would it not break the heart if God said to us, ‘It is true, my son, that your breath smells and your rags drip with mud and slime, but we are charitable here and no one will upbraid you with these things, nor draw away from you. Enter into the joy’? Should we not reply, ‘With submission, sir, and if there is no objection, I’d rather be cleaned first.’ ‘It may hurt, you know’ - ‘Even so, sir.’
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I assume that the process of purification will normally involve suffering. Partly from tradition; partly because most real good that has been done me in this life has involved it. But I don’t think the suffering is the purpose of the purgation. I can well believe that people neither much worse nor much better than I will suffer less than I or more. . . . The treatment given will be the one required, whether it hurts little or much.
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My favourite image on this matter comes from the dentist’s chair. I hope that when the tooth of life is drawn and I am ‘coming round’,’ a voice will say, ‘Rinse your mouth out with this.’ This will be Purgatory. The rinsing may take longer than I can now imagine. The taste of this may be more fiery and astringent than my present sensibility could endure. But . . . it will [not] be disgusting and unhallowed."
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  • C.S. Lewis, Letters To Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, chapter 20, paragraphs 7-10, pages 108-109
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I think discussion of purgatory and indulgences really needs to be rescued from the misconceptions of ‘time,’ ‘punishment,’ and ‘payment.’ ‘Purgatory’ essentially means ‘purification;’ ‘indulgence’ is a grace.

I also think about this in terms of some simple premises, which can easily be defended from Scriptures, Tradition, and natural law, and from which can be drawn conclusions:
  1. Nothing unholy can be admitted into God’s presence.
  2. Few of us attain perfect holiness or unity with Christ in this life, such that our every act and thought is in union with God; we are instead restrained by our own frailties, vices (bad habits), and wounded natures.
  3. Sin wounds and stains the soul; just as a bad habit lingers and the inclination must be fought even after stopping “cold turkey,” so too does a forgiveness in Reconciliation not fully heal and clean our souls (it’s more that it stitches us up, stops the bleeding, washes the filth; but the soul still needs to heal after that treatment, and the stain left after the filth needs to more rigorous treatment to remove).
  4. Suffering is redemptive; God offers graces through it, and it can be a forge of virtue.
  5. God is all just as well as all merciful; His justice must be answered as well as His mercy.
From these I find that forgiveness of my sins is not enough. My soul needs to be fully healed of them, washed clean of all stains. This can happen in this life or the next, through the “refiner’s fire.”

Though I strive for it, I expect I will not be perfectly holy when I die, perfectly in union with God. I therefore still need training in holiness, still need purification.

Moreover, I expect that the sense of justice (as well as mercy) only heightens the closer we come to God, and I can tell you right now that by my sense of justice, I deserve some sentence to make up for it. Jesus bore the fullest price for my sins, for which I am eternally grateful, but love for Him demands that I also participate in that payment; I cannot stand the thought of not paying some price myself, not suffering along with Him for what I have done to Him.

So just like CS Lewis’s example, I expect that my soul, from a sense of justice and a desire for holiness, will beg that some part of a just sentence be rendered to me, even while I beg for mercy; and that I will beg to be allowed to “wash up” before dinner, before the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.

Yes, the process may involve deep suffering. I believe a great part of that suffering comes at the Judgment Seat when I see the full gravity of all the sins of my life and how terrible they are in light of Christ’s holiness, and my remorse will be so great it will be torture to bear.
 
In fact, I believe a part of what may happen in purgatory is the soul’s struggle to forgive itself.

After all, think of parents who even by some accident cause grievous harm to their child, even those who have run over their own children by accident and killed them (yes, it has happened on many occasions, too horrifying to contemplate). Could you on this earth forgive yourself? Even thinking about it, I can only begin to imagine a loving parents’ pain, far greater than any physical pain could possibly be, driving one to want to commit suicide just to end that pain.

If we in a similar circumstance–an accident–would suffer terribly before forgiving ourselves, how much more terrible will our struggle and suffering be when we meet the absolutely innocent and perfectly loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit upon death, knowing that “accident” does not describe the willfulness of what we have done?

That’s the worst part of purgatory, to me. However, I don’t know how we can come into God’s presence if we cannot forgive ourselves, because the shame and remorse would make us keep away from His throne.

Indulgences are good practices that help to heal and cleanse our souls, or acts of love that serve to help others to forgive themselves and heal and cleanse their souls. By Christ’s authority (as Head of the Church, He uses it through the Church), indulgences are like “community service” hours that can help address all of that, and ease the suffering involved.
 
God in his infinite Love, requires every soul to be finally purified (state of Purgatory) before being able to see the infinite Good – Himself. Just imagine how can one creature literally see God as He is without being first holy? How can one be holy by himself, if not only by God’s grace.

If we pray, “Your Will be done”, how can we not appreciate Purgatory, Indulgences, and the Sacraments?
 
Starting as a very curious religious child I queried the word “punishment” for sin, and was cionfused by the “fires” of purgatory and hell. Later studies taught me that fire is purifying for metals and applied to souls, getting them ready for going to see the Face of the All-Holy who invtes us through Jesus into His Presence totally unworthily of ourselves.
Finally only recently decided PUNISHNMENT is not the correct word, because it is not like being grounded for denting the family car or getting a Cminus in Math. It is that as the Pope’s quote suggests, the result of attachment to sin over our lives. It is being purified, cleansed of the effects of sins which are forgiven. It is not unpaid debt, or vindictive punishment. It is RESTORATION to becoming CHRISTENED, made totally Christ-like who has washed the dirt off and now the Divine image is restored. .
 
John 20:23:
"“If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.”

Nowhere do I see any mention of temporal punishment. If you have a tooth pulled, it’s either still in your mouth or it is not. Barnes’ notes on the Bible states:
“Whose soever sins … - See the notes at Matthew 16:19; Matthew 18:18. It is worthy of remark here that Jesus confers the same power on all the apostles. He gives to no one of them any special authority. If Peter, as the Papists pretend, had been appointed to any special authority, it is wonderful that the Saviour did not here hint at any such pre-eminence. This passage conclusively proves that they were invested with equal power in organizing and governing the church. The authority which he had given Peter to preach the gospel first to the Jews and the Gentiles, does not militate against this. See the notes at Matthew 16:18-19. This authority given them was full proof that they were inspired. The meaning of the passage is not that man can forgive sins that belongs only to God Isaiah 43:23 but that they should be inspired; that in founding the church, and in declaring the will of God, they should be taught by the Holy Spirit to declare on what terms, to what characters, and to what temper of mind God would extend forgiveness of sins. It was not authority to forgive individuals, but to establish in all the churches the terms and conditions on which men might be pardoned, with a promise that God would confirm all that they taught; that all might have assurance of forgiveness who would comply with those terms; and that those who did not comply should not be forgiven, but that their sins should be retained. This commission is as far as possible from the authority which the Roman Catholic claims of remitting sin and of pronouncing pardon.”

What say you to this?

I am a devout and practicing Roman Catholic. The elaborate and mysterious and unapproachable dogma that confuses the simple words that Jesus uttered confuses and angers me. Only God can forgive sin; the priest is the conduit for eliciting the best possible acknowledgment and “confession”, if you will, and then acts on behalf of Jesus as described in scripture. To say that mortal sin retains temporal punishment even though Jesus clearly does NOT say that (“Go and sin no more”, isn’t that what He said to Mary Magdalene who was surely committing mortal sin if a prostitute?) is to change the intention of Jesus (and what is that called?). The majority of people are of average intelligence and they do not read the historical documents of various Popes (some of whom themselves were guilty of grievous sin). Jesus didn’t come to save the intellectuals, he came to the sinners, the poor, those who had limited intelligence (I don’t think fishermen are particularly well educated, even in this day and age). This elaboration upon indulgences (which, by themselves, I do not find anywhere in scripture) to the point where one must memorize the catechism (if one can even understand it) and read all of the encyclicals on any topic is unacceptable. Has anyone asked God about this??
 
Ever consider Protestantism? You seem to already have the sola scriptura part down pretty good.
 
I understand the need for purification after committing sin, either in this life or in Purgatory. One thing that seems inconsistent with this is the Church’s teaching that one who is baptized as an adult and dies soon after does not go to Purgatory, but directly to Heaven. In what way is the adult who is baptized (after committing many sins in his/her life) different, in terms of the need for purification before entering into the presence of God in Heaven, from an adult who confesses his/her sins in the Sacrement of Penance? I would appreciate it if someone could explain this.
 
lagerlund said:
I understand the need for purification after committing sin, either in this life or in Purgatory. One thing that seems inconsistent with this is the Church’s teaching that one who is baptized as an adult and dies soon after does not go to Purgatory, but directly to Heaven. In what way is the adult who is baptized (after committing many sins in his/her life) different, in terms of the need for purification before entering into the presence of God in Heaven, from an adult who confesses his/her sins in the Sacrement of Penance? I would appreciate it if someone could explain this.
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Could you point out where it states that adults bypass purgatory if they die soon after Baptism? I’m not sure one way or the other about that teaching but I know it’s taught that, in either case you mentioned, the Kingdom of God is guaranteed.
 
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