Your opinion on Purgatory?

[thecolorsblend]

Well then why are you looking for precise words saying that the sin nature is taken care of?

Because you claim (or have claimed) that our sin nature is purged at the moment we place faith in Our Lord. You simultaneously profess to abide by Sola Scriptura. Ergo the foundation of your belief must logically be Scripture. Therefore I requested that you supply me with the Scriptural verse(s) that cause you to believe what you do.

Up to this point, however, you’ve provided Scriptures relating to salvation, the coming Messiah, the nature of God’s covenant with Israel, the establishing of a better covenant with the Church and a host of other subjects. What you have not done yet though is provide a Scriptural citation justifying your apparent belief that our sin nature is purged at the moment we place faith in Our Lord.

Jesus did it all for me and for you - even though you don’t recognize this fact. Jesus needs no further help.

At no time have I ever claimed otherwise.

I posted a lot of scripture Colorsblend.

With respect, none of it had any relevance to the topic at hand.

It has to do with what Jesus was going to do. It was ONE WORK, NOT TWO. You want Jesus to have completed TWO works, one for sin and one for the sin nature.
GOD PLANNED ONE WORK.

If this belief is so self-evident in Scripture, why have you been unable to supply a verse from Scripture to bolster your claim? I was able to do so rather easily with my quote from 1 Corinthians.

One tends to believe what one has been taught.

I disagree. Were that the case, theoretically you would be arguing the Catholic position and I would be arguing the Protestant position. And yet we’re both converts speaking against what apparently we were taught our entire lives.

I’d have to go back and read what I said.

You wrote…

Romans 5:1-2 speaks to how we have peace with God and are justified by faith. It speaks to His grace. It’s His grace we’re depending on. It speaks to how we STAND in this grace. Why would this grace cover sins and not the S.N. ?

Interpreted literally, you’re in effect saying that our sin nature is purged at the moment we place faith in Our Lord. And yet people keep sinning anyway which effectively leaves you arguing (ironically enough) that Our Lord’s grace is seemingly not sufficient to keep us from sin.

Obviously I don’t believe that and I suspect you don’t actually believe it either… but that is the logical outcome of your argument.

This might help if you read it with an open mind:

It is not a literal fire, but a figurative fire that will try men. It is spoken of in Malachi 3:1-3;

While I do not grant your premise (but I do applaud your effort), for discussion’s sake let’s say you’re right about this. Let’s say that Malachi is saying that in the afterlife Our Lord will personally separate us from our sin nature somehow.

In effect, if not name, you’re still arguing in favor of the reality of Purgatory. You’re basically agreeing with me. The end result is the same whether you call it “Purgatory” or whether you call it “the purifying process spoken of by Malachi”. They’re functionally identical.

So if we’re getting down to brass tacks finally, why do you so object to “Purgatory” as a label when, if the above represents your new beliefs, you and I basically agree on the function if not the particulars of the name?

No need for a different thread. If you’re involved enough in church, you know I’m right.

Whether you’re right or whether you’re mistaken is irrelevant; the discussion belongs in a separate thread.

 

[frangiuliano115]

Actually, there is something that Paul wrote ("[Jesus] was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.") that shows the arrangement:
He died the sentence of death (for the forgiveness of our sentence of death to be given to us when we seek absolution),
and his resurrection was for our “justification” which is the dealing with the old nature, the “sin nature” and creating us in a new birth. When he was raised, he went to his disciples and breathed on them and gave them his Holy Spirit (which they inhaled into themselves, into their souls, which were then new creatures, and which Holy Spirit they give to us in our Baptism and Confirmation).

The Holy Spirit is here making us new creatures by his resurrection, and this is different than God not counting our past sins any more as the debt we owe or the death we deserve.

There is forgiveness of sins
and
there is a new creature (justification), a “good person”

Psalm 51 is what a person experiences of the Salvation given by God in Christ.
It could be viewed as the premier Act of Contrition, and it reveals a lot about forgiveness of sin and the “sin nature”.
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions.
Here, Mercy is begged for, meaning Forgiveness of Sins is requested. This is about asking that the sentence of “Eternal Death” be removed.
(Removing the death sentence is mercy - saying that a guilty person is “not guilty” is a ruling of justice about the crime, it is the judge saying “no crime was committed, but the person is justified in having done the deeds they did”)
Let me live (mercy) and do not put me on trial again for these sins.

2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin!
Here, the penitent is asking that the “iniquity”, the “inequality he created by injustice” be cleansed.
Here he is asking that God would do something TO HIM, not asking that God do something inside God.
“Apply cleaning to me so that I do things justly from now on, do something to my nature so that I will not sin against you but instead do only justice to you and my neighbor.”

3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
“I know the injustices I have done for self-benefit, and no matter what transgression of justice, it has all been really against you…”

5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
“… and I see my ‘sin nature’. It is more than simply sins. It is my inward being that I am seeking help for, also, not just that you remove the death sentence, because I want to be your friend again.
I have not had truth in my inward being, but you have now been teaching me wisdom in the secret heart of mine”

7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have broken rejoice
“After you have mercy and remove the death sentence, also do something TO ME, to my nature, so that I am not filthy but only wearing a clean robe - clean me fully so that I am actually good through and through, so that I am virtuous as you are virtuous, perfect as you are perfect, fully white as snow just as Jesus shined on the Mountain of Transfiguration, so that I am fully like Him”.

9 Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
“To re-state it in summary,
FIRST: Have Mercy and do not carry out the sentence of death; let go of the debt I rightly owe to you.”
“SECOND: Do a work of Grace within me, by your Holy Spirit, where you will renew me into a person of Justice who does not do evil but instead does good (give me the Virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity so that all my works will now be works of Faith, Hope and Charity, rather than works of Vice).”

I doubt there’s more to be said on purgatory. I know your belief, you know mine - we’re not going to convince each other. We’ll each answer to God for the light we have received.

But since you’re really good with scripture and I do respect your opinion, let me have you opinion of this:

Some say when we are born again, regenerated, come to believe, accept our christianity (call it what you will) our sin nature DIES.

The Catholic church teaches, and I agree (isn’t that nice of me??!) that it is put under dominion. Could you think of a VERY SPECIFIC verse that says that the sin nature is put under dominion? I’ve tried every verse I could think of but none is very specific because when the letters were being written how could the writers possibly know all these incorrect doctrine would evolve? Know what I mean? Another one that makes me crazy is OSAS. But that’s easier to show than the sin nature. Also, because Paul interchanges Sin Nature with Flesh many times and this causes some confusion unless one really knows and accepts the concept.

Just picking your brain a little. Don’t send me a bill !

FG

 

[thecolorsblend]

Some say when we are born again, regenerated, come to believe, accept our christianity (call it what you will) our sin nature DIES.

You’re the only one making that argument as far as I know.

 

[John_Martin]

I doubt there’s more to be said on purgatory. I know your belief, you know mine - we’re not going to convince each other. We’ll each answer to God for the light we have received.

But since you’re really good with scripture and I do respect your opinion, let me have you opinion of this:

Some say when we are born again, regenerated, come to believe, accept our christianity (call it what you will) our sin nature DIES.

The Catholic church teaches, and I agree (isn’t that nice of me??!) that it is put under dominion. Could you think of a VERY SPECIFIC verse that says that the sin nature is put under dominion? I’ve tried every verse I could think of but none is very specific because when the letters were being written how could the writers possibly know all these incorrect doctrine would evolve? Know what I mean? Another one that makes me crazy is OSAS. But that’s easier to show than the sin nature. Also, because Paul interchanges Sin Nature with Flesh many times and this causes some confusion unless one really knows and accepts the concept.

Just picking your brain a little. Don’t send me a bill !

FG

If I were to show you verses that appear to support an idea that “the sin nature is put under dominion”, I would be doing one of two things:
Either:

1. I would be your teacher whom you trust completely and you would believe my instruction
2. I would be an independent interpreter trying to win popular acceptance of my interpretation. (or with a group of independent interpreters trying to gain growth in the size of our camp, thinking that there is truth in numbers of similar thinkers)

The protestant (protesting) churches are simply that, assemblies of like minded independent people maintaining that they have the correct meaning of the texts, but with no authority over them who tells them what the text really means.

There were two independent thinkers walking, who thought they knew the Bible, but could not figure out something about Jesus. Then a third man came along and called them foolish and explained it all to them. That man knew and was what they needed. They needed someone to explain who knew, not someone who gave his personal opinion.
It was the same with a guy from Ethiopia, an independent reader of the Bible, who was reading Isaiah. He couldn’t figure it out, and when another man asked him, if he understood what he was reading he said, “How can I understand unless someone guides me?” So the second man told him exactly what it meant, not his opinion of what it meant.

The third man explaining the truth was Jesus, opening the scriptures to two men on the road to Emmaus. The second man explaining to the Ethiopian was Philip, a person sent by Jesus to give true meaning to people who could not understand without an official explainer sent to them.

In the path you have chosen, you are setting yourself as a judge over anyone explaining the truth to you, and will not accept someone telling you a “truth” that is different than what you are yourself reasoning from your independent reading and thinking. But I don’t give you opinions from my reading and thinking, but give only what has been given to me to give, given by the ones who have what they also received from the One who sent them. The two disciples on the Emmaus road were excited to have been with the one who gives them the real truth, the Ethiopian was excited to be with the one who could give him the real truth about Isaiah and also had authority to give him salvation by baptizing him, and I am excited to be taught by the Church and given life in the Sacraments. There is no room for opinions, but only for someone who knows and gives it to me. I know because the one I trustingly listen to knows, and feeds me.

So, I don’t give opinions about what bible verses I might think would indicate that “the sin nature is put under dominion”. I don’t bring a theory to the bible to find proof for that idea. That is like being an independent inventor of an ideology.

 

[frangiuliano115]

If I were to show you verses that appear to support an idea that “the sin nature is put under dominion”, I would be doing one of two things:
Either:

1. I would be your teacher whom you trust completely and you would believe my instruction
2. I would be an independent interpreter trying to win popular acceptance of my interpretation. (or with a group of independent interpreters trying to gain growth in the size of our camp, thinking that there is truth in numbers of similar thinkers)

The protestant (protesting) churches are simply that, assemblies of like minded independent people maintaining that they have the correct meaning of the texts, but with no authority over them who tells them what the text really means.

There were two independent thinkers walking, who thought they knew the Bible, but could not figure out something about Jesus. Then a third man came along and called them foolish and explained it all to them. That man knew and was what they needed. They needed someone to explain who knew, not someone who gave his personal opinion.
It was the same with a guy from Ethiopia, an independent reader of the Bible, who was reading Isaiah. He couldn’t figure it out, and when another man asked him, if he understood what he was reading he said, “How can I understand unless someone guides me?” So the second man told him exactly what it meant, not his opinion of what it meant.

The third man explaining the truth was Jesus, opening the scriptures to two men on the road to Emmaus. The second man explaining to the Ethiopian was Philip, a person sent by Jesus to give true meaning to people who could not understand without an official explainer sent to them.

In the path you have chosen, you are setting yourself as a judge over anyone explaining the truth to you, and will not accept someone telling you a “truth” that is different than what you are yourself reasoning from your independent reading and thinking. But I don’t give you opinions from my reading and thinking, but give only what has been given to me to give, given by the ones who have what they also received from the One who sent them. The two disciples on the Emmaus road were excited to have been with the one who gives them the real truth, the Ethiopian was excited to be with the one who could give him the real truth about Isaiah and also had authority to give him salvation by baptizing him, and I am excited to be taught by the Church and given life in the Sacraments. There is no room for opinions, but only for someone who knows and gives it to me. I know because the one I trustingly listen to knows, and feeds me.

So, I don’t give opinions about what bible verses I might think would indicate that “the sin nature is put under dominion”. I don’t bring a theory to the bible to find proof for that idea. That is like being an independent inventor of an ideology.

Gee thanks. I needed that.
I guess you forgot that I used to be Catholic.
What I was asking you was for specific scripture to PROVE WHAT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH TEACHES.
I think you misunderstood my request.
ANYWAY, there is plenty of scripture saying the sin nature has been put under submission. I would have liked one to show that it is NOT dead, which it isn’t even according to Catholic doctrine, but, really, I doubt you could have found one specifically saying that it is NOT dead.

By the way, protestant theologians aren’t all stupid you know.
And if there was PROTEST, it must have been AGAINST SOMETHING.
I’m sure you know what it was…

FG

 

[John_Martin]

Gee thanks. I needed that.
I guess you forgot that I used to be Catholic.
What I was asking you was for specific scripture to PROVE WHAT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH TEACHES.
I think you misunderstood my request.
ANYWAY, there is plenty of scripture saying the sin nature has been put under submission. I would have liked one to show that it is NOT dead, which it isn’t even according to Catholic doctrine, but, really, I doubt you could have found one specifically saying that it is NOT dead.

By the way, protestant theologians aren’t all stupid you know.
And if there was PROTEST, it must have been AGAINST SOMETHING.
I’m sure you know what it was…

FG

I think you misunderstand, the Catholic Church does not prove Anything, but is the definer of Everything, since it has the Holy Spirit guiding it into all truth. There is absolutely no proof of Catholic Teaching - there is only the Authority of the Witness, the Apostolic Witness, which is today the Pope and Magisterium.

The Bible is what we (the Catholic Church) assembled together from our writings to each other to help each other grow in faith and holiness. We did not put the Bible together for external readers to try and prove things, as if they were reading it with Catholic faith, trusting their teachers to guide them.

You read your Bible, but it does not belong to you; you have stripped out books from it in your protesting wisdom, and you don’t know what you are doing when you read it.

 

[frangiuliano115]

I think you misunderstand, the Catholic Church does not prove Anything, but is the definer of Everything, since it has the Holy Spirit guiding it into all truth. There is absolutely no proof of Catholic Teaching - there is only the Authority of the Witness, the Apostolic Witness, which is today the Pope and Magisterium.

The Bible is what we (the Catholic Church) assembled together from our writings to each other to help each other grow in faith and holiness. We did not put the Bible together for external readers to try and prove things, as if they were reading it with Catholic faith, trusting their teachers to guide them.

You read your Bible, but it does not belong to you; you have stripped out books from it in your protesting wisdom, and you don’t know what you are doing when you read it.

Thanks for the Brotherly love. This is one of the reasons I left the RCC. It goes to some people’s heads tio hear all their lives that they go to the one true church.

You’re preaching to the choirJM. I keep telling you I was Catholic. I taught there for years. You think you know the doctrine better than some? Have you stood in front of a class to teach biblical passages (which is much in vogue now in the RCC BTW, it seems they’ve caught up) and the CCC and be ready to answer questions from real live people.

I’m sorry. I was sharing something interesting from Christianity with you thinking yoiu might be a brother in Christ - instead you just want to prove that you own everything.
God is a big God and you do not own Him.

Will no longer respond to this thread.
FG

 

[John_Martin]

Thanks for the Brotherly love. This is one of the reasons I left the RCC. It goes to some people’s heads tio hear all their lives that they go to the one true church.

You’re preaching to the choirJM. I keep telling you I was Catholic. I taught there for years. You think you know the doctrine better than some? Have you stood in front of a class to teach biblical passages (which is much in vogue now in the RCC BTW, it seems they’ve caught up) and the CCC and be ready to answer questions from real live people.

I’m sorry. I was sharing something interesting from Christianity with you thinking yoiu might be a brother in Christ - instead you just want to prove that you own everything.
God is a big God and you do not own Him.

Will no longer respond to this thread.
FG

Again you are mistaken.
If we were on your turf, outside the bounds of a Catholic site, I would say none of these things. I have warm and congenial and mutually beneficial conversations with many non-Catholics.
But you came to this site, where Catholics want to understand more about their faith, and you tell them there is no Purgatory. Well, I will stand against you with every bit of understanding I have at this site to expose your insincerity and unfaithfulness to the messengers sent to use by Jesus with the message they bring. You are trying to muddle the thinking of immature Catholics to match your own.

Also, I have only been a Catholic for 5 years. Prior to that a very well educated protestant, Lutheran (I will no longer dignify that name with the word “reformed”). I have heard all my life that the true church is not the Catholic Church, and I do know all the things you think you have found in Protestantism, and it is an illusion of thinking you have truth.
You, yourself, on these posts, by declaring there is no Purgatory, are declaring that the Catholic Church is FALSE and deluded and lying.

I do not boast about myself, but about the Church, Christ’s Body and Bridegroom, not leading me astray. You boast about your personal interpretation of a book called the Bible. Is there a Purgatory? Who says so? Your personal interpretation of the Bible, or the Church sent by Christ?

 

[ffg]

I don’t know if I’ve ever really analyzed Purgatory, let’s see what happens.

As a foundation, I’ll start with Heaven being a place where there is only perfection.

Another foundation is that Heaven is a place where some humans might take up residence.

If God loves me and I don’t love Him back exactly as He loves me, then that means there is a disconnect.

Since I am not God (I would know this, if I was), I’ll call the disconnect an imperfect love on my part.

God’s love could then be classified as ‘perfect’.

A key clue to knowing the scope of my imperfection is to compare my life to the first sin. My imperfection is much worse than being tricked into eating an apple.

Considering the fall-out from Eve’s comparatively tiny sin, things aren’t looking too bright for me at the moment.

God knows that preventing me from my own stupidity is a constant job, and He loves the famous line - work smarter, not harder.

So, in one act, He paved the way for me to reconcile with Him, along with every other human, even while living and loving imperfectly.

I appreciate that I may never know what perfection truly is while living on earth, and that it is a guarantee that I will die imperfect.

So, some kind of purification will have to happen to me, not done by me, for me to take up residence where there is only perfection.

That’s my thought on Purgatory.

Now, though Purgatory seems to be a far off place, I do think it is quite connected to suffering on earth, especially at the end of life on earth. I seem to be witnessing a lot of it lately.

Take care,

Mike

 

[John_Martin]

I don’t know if I’ve ever really analyzed Purgatory, let’s see what happens.

As a foundation, I’ll start with Heaven being a place where there is only perfection.

Another foundation is that Heaven is a place where some humans might take up residence.

If God loves me and I don’t love Him back exactly as He loves me, then that means there is a disconnect.

Since I am not God (I would know this, if I was), I’ll call the disconnect an imperfect love on my part.

God’s love could then be classified as ‘perfect’.

A key clue to knowing the scope of my imperfection is to compare my life to the first sin. My imperfection is much worse than being tricked into eating an apple.

Considering the fall-out from Eve’s comparatively tiny sin, things aren’t looking too bright for me at the moment.

God knows that preventing me from my own stupidity is a constant job, and He loves the famous line - work smarter, not harder.

So, in one act, He paved the way for me to reconcile with Him, along with every other human, even while living and loving imperfectly.

I appreciate that I may never know what perfection truly is while living on earth, and that it is a guarantee that I will die imperfect.

So, some kind of purification will have to happen to me, not done by me, for me to take up residence where there is only perfection.

That’s my thought on Purgatory.

Now, though Purgatory seems to be a far off place, I do think it is quite connected to suffering on earth, especially at the end of life on earth. I seem to be witnessing a lot of it lately.

Take care,

Mike

The key is Love - when you love someone and want to give yourself to them, you want them to have goodness equal to the goodness they should have, goodness suited to how good you see them to be.
That is why God’s gift to us with the Holy Spirit is infused Virtue - so that we have it to do all our giving of ourselves to him virtuously (good giving of goodness, which is what the One we love should have). He gives us his Spirit so we can be with him without shame that our being with him is improper.
And Purgatory is the place where we come to terms with knowing that all we have desired or enjoyed apart from God fails us, all of that is not the God and Goodness we want. Then our hearts are purely desiring him, desiring that he have us wholly.