In my last talk for the parish class I am teaching, Purgatory came up, and I briefly addressed it. A good analogy I have found for the need for Purgatory is the idea of restitution. This amazing true story highlights it powerfully:
She thought she might get off with a few Hail Marys. Instead, she got three years in prison.
The 27-year-old New Jersey woman who cried rape and put away an innocent man had no idea what coming clean would cost her when she stepped into a confessional a year ago and told her priest everything.
“She was going to confess this was her sin and that was it,” said a source familiar with the shocking recantation of Biurny Peguero Gonzalez, who on Tuesday was sentenced to one to three years in prison for falsely accusing William McCaffrey of a violent sexual assault in 2005.
The priest told her that she had to do everything in her power to get the man she had falsely accused freed. And she did, and it cost her big time: jail. Wow.
Yet, if we took a purely spiritual approach to forgiveness, she shouldn’t have had to do anything else because God had forgiven her since she was repentant. Why should she have to undergo temporal punishment for her sins which were forgiven?
Put in this light, it’s obvious to anyone that “of course she had to try to make right what was wrong and even face the consequences of her sins” even if those sins were forgiven.
Purgatory is similar. There is temporal punishment due for our sins–sometimes of a big and obvious nature like for this woman–and we can be forgiven the sin but still have to undergo that punishment.
But wasn’t that the idea of atonement? That the price was paid through blood?
I think there are a lot of things that we pay for in this life. We pay if we don’t invest our time wisely and plan ahead, we pay for crimes when caught. That is different than paying to God for our crimes, our sins. I think purgatory is a prime example of how man wants to see this injustice settled directly by the suffering of the person, and meted out by God. That settles for us this idea that revenge is the Lords, he will avenge me. But, that the person is presented himself as justified, not justified alone in Christ because of Christs suffering is I think, a theological twist.
To me it smacks of the Church seeking control of helping you ease the suffering through indugences, which they distribute. If they distribute them, then they have power, afterall, who wants to suffer a punishment? That punishment, it used to be taught, was for possibly decades or even centuries after their loved ones departed. I understand that is no longer believed, is that correct?
But, back to your thesis- I see no inconsistency in applying the law of the land to punish someone to the fullest extent, and Christ’s forgiveness of those sins commited at the same time. God has governments over us for a purpose, and we are to obey them with some noted exceptions.
God bless,
Garret
Garret,
I would say: exactly, Jesus paid for our sins through his blood, and he forgives us, so…
If the State were following (Protestant) Christian principles, once that person repented and was forgiven by God, the slate should be washed clean, no extra punishment or restitution should be needed. God has forgiven him and his sin is forgiven, so we should to.
But this woman was repentant and asked for forgiveness, and (we believe that) God in his mercy forgave her. So _assuming the State were to implement Protestant principles_, she shouldn’t have to go to jail at all. Do you agree?
The Catholic position is also the one that is most reasonable (even to non-believers): you hit someone over the head and took their money. You may have repented and been forgiven by God, but at the very least, you are going to pay back the money you took from that person and pay their medical bills. You can’t just say “well God forgave me, so you should to and it should be a done deal with nothing more for me to pay back.”
Hi Devin
No, I would say you are confused here. God in His mercy forgave her- Great and praise God. Now here in society, she has to pay a penalty. Society is not God, God is not society- she has a debt to both Devin. Her debt to God is forgiven- not through her, but through Christ.
Further, Jesus is the God of the Bible, not a different God, and we can see how a theocratic society built on the Law that He gave us handled justice. It demanded justice- equal justice one tooth for a tooth, not a tooth and an arm for a tooth- God wants to see justice done, and he hates the ‘crooked scale’ and deception.
What you call the ‘Catholic position’ is just that – catholic- as in, universal. A sense of Justice and restitution here for the party wronged is in order with justice. The Protestant view is not different.
If you actually want to talk about justice, I could talk about moving priests to different parishes instead of defrocking them when they prove to do the unspeakable to innocent children. THAT is not justice Devin. That is my Los Angeles Cardinal Mahoney, friend to the pope- shifting the despicable from one corner to the next.
God bless,
Garret
Garret,
The analogy I drew does require suspending our current reality and applying these other ideas. But you have provided me with an even better example in Cardinal Mahoney.
Firstly, I agree that moving abusive priests from one parish to another (after receiving goofy 70s-era “psychological rehabilitation”) was a horrible idea. The scandal caused by these priests and the bishops who exercised such grievously poor judgment, or who were afraid of the truth coming out, still hurts the Church to this day.
But let’s look at another aspect of this case: Cardinal Mahoney is not in jail. Why not? I don’t know, but I would guess that either he didn’t actually break a law by moving them around or the statute of limitations had run out or something like that. Yet, his actions were evil. We hope and believe that he has asked for forgiveness from God in those he indirectly hurt by moving these abusers around, and that God has forgiven him.
Yet, there is temporal punishment due for these sins, ones which cannot be paid here below (and the State isn’t even trying to punish him). Purgatory awaits. His sins are forgiven; he is in a state of sanctifying grace, yet this temporal punishment must be paid, either here on earth or before he enters Heaven. This is the reason for Purgatory. If God didn’t put him there after his death, he would throw himself there to be purified of attachment to sin and to pay this temporal punishment.
Of course, he could obtain a plenary indulgence and have this punishment paid. Hopefully he will; the Church offers those graces through the merits of Christ and the communion of saints, but we must avail ourselves of it.
I do not expect you to believe in Purgatory. It is not explicitly found in the Bible, and those passages that do reference it are interpreted by Protestants to mean something else (there’s that pesky issue of interpretive authority again).