LETTER TO THE PEOPLE OF GOD, OCTOBER, 2009

HELL, PURGATORY OR HEAVEN?

The believer who in the daily struggle soils his or her baptismal robe through sin has recourse to Jesus Christ who is “trustworthy and upright, so that he will forgive our sins and will cleanse us from all evil” (1 John 1:9). He established the Sacrament of Reconciliation with which he empowered the Church to forgive sins in his name (see John 20:22-23). The Sacrament of Reconciliation is always available for the washing off of the dirt not on the body but on the conscience. The Christian must constantly strive to “be sincere in heart and filled with faith, our hearts sprinkled and free from any trace of bad conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb. 10:22). Why should a person confess his or her sins to a fellow human being who is also a sinner? Level One question! The Lord made it so! The Jews rightly asked, “Who but God can forgive sins?” (Mark 2:7) Yes, only God can forgive sins. But God has given the power to forgive sins to human beings who in his name forgive sins. James said, “So confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another to be cured; for the heartfelt prayer of someone upright works very powerfully” (James 5:16). The Sacramental confession with which the ordained minister of the Church remits sins is a part of the discipline of the Church to which the believer submits in all humility. Sacramental confession is a wholesome act through which the believer receives the forgiveness of God and reconciliation with the Body of Christ wounded by the sins of its members. This is the path of salvation!

Personal Salvation - Seeing God Face to Face
The final end of salvation is to see God face to face! Catholic theology calls it the “Beatific vision”. The destiny of the believer who is upright (1 John 2:29) is given by St. John: “My dear friends, we are God's children, but what we shall be in the future has not yet been revealed. We are well aware that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he really is” (1 John 3:2). The Beatitudes will be fully realised and fulfilled in that vision of God as He really is (see Matt. 5:3-10). For the just and upright are the people whom the Father has blessed (see Matt. 25:34). They will receive eternal life (see Matt. 25:46). This eternal life is the end of the search, seeking and longing for every true believer and for that purpose St. Peter was determined to stick with the Master who teaches strange things and uses “intolerable language” (see John 6:60). “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the message of eternal life, and we believe; we have come to know that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:68). The eternal life is the life of the Blessed in Heaven! “This perfect life with the Most Holy Trinity, this communion of life and love with the Trinity, with the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed is called 'heaven.' Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfilment of the deepest human longings, the state of supreme, definitive happiness”. The Book of Revelation describes Heaven as “Jerusalem, the holy city, coming down out of heaven from God. It had all the glory of God and glittered like some precious jewel of crystal-clear diamond” (Rev. 21:10-11), and of exceeding beauty, “lit by the radiant glory of God, and the Lamb was a lighted torch for it…. Nothing unclean may come into it: no one who does what is loathsome or false, but only those who are listed in the Lamb's book of life” (Rev. 21: 23-27).

Heaven-Paradise-New Jerusalem
The Catechism continues, “The life of the blessed consists in the full and perfect possession of the fruits of the redemption [objective salvation], accomplished by Christ. He makes partners in his heavenly glorification those who have believed in him and remained faithful to his will. Heaven is the blessed community of all who are perfectly incorporated into Christ [in Christ, are with Christ]”. All who died in Christ in full friendship with him, who persevere in keeping the commandments of God and faith in Jesus are the blessed according to the Book of Revelation: “Then I heard a voice from heaven say to me, 'Write down: Blessed are those who die in the Lord! Blessed indeed, the Spirit says; now they can rest for ever after their work, since their good deeds go with them” (Rev. 14:13). It is only when a person finds himself or herself in heaven before the presence of the thrice holy God that he or she can say “It is accomplished!” (Consummatum est). The personal consummatum est of the individual has brought to fruition the objective consummatum est of the redemptive work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

Hell-Gehenna-Eternal Furnace
The failure of a person to appropriate the fruits of the consummatum est of Jesus Christ is eternal damnation. It is eternal punishment (see Matt. 25:46). It is eternal condemnation for those who do not believe (see Mark 16:16). Jesus variously described the state of condemnation as hell fire, “Gehenna”, the unquenchable fire, the furnace of fire, the eternal fire, where the worm will never die nor their fire be put out (see Mark 9:48). It is graphically described as “the burning lake.” “This burning lake is the second death [definitive death, ultimate death, eternal death]; and anybody whose name could not be found written in the book of life was hurled into the burning lake” (Rev. 20:14-15). This burning lake is the heritage of the accursed. “But the legacy for cowards, for those who break their word, or worship obscenities, for murderers and the sexually immoral, and for sorcerers, worshippers of false gods or any other sort of liars, is the second death in the burning lake of sulphur” (Rev. 21:8). This second death, indeed, eternal death, called “Hell” is the real death. It is the real disaster that can befall a person. And Jesus shows us who to fear, the person who can destroy both body and soul in hell (see Matt. 10:28). It is the ultimate punishment. The worst and definitive sentence to the wicked is: “Go away from me, with your curse upon you, to eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (see Matt. 25:41). Hell is the eternal punishment (Matt. 25:46).

The evidence of scripture is too strong for any serious objection against the reality of Hell, the fate of those condemned, those not saved. The state of definitive and eternal separation from God is the unfortunate lot of those who have chosen to be eternally excluded from vision of God. Mortal sin leads to death, the eternal death: “For the wage paid by sin is death” (see Rom. 6:23). Those who by personal choice turn definitively away from God by mortal sin and die in that state are lost and lost for ever. They have not attained the eternal salvation won inchoately by Christ for all by his death on the cross. Eternal salvation is available to all but not all benefit from it to attain the eternal life of the blessed. Pope Benedict XVI sums up the Church teaching on Hell: “With death, our life-choice becomes definitives, our life stands before the judge. Our choice, which in the course of an entire life takes on a certain shape, can have a variety of forms. There can be people who have totally destroyed their desire for truth and readiness to love, people for whom everything has become a lie, people who have lived for hatred and have suppressed all love within themselves. This is a terrifying thought, but alarming profiles of this type can be seen in certain figures of our own history. In such people all would be beyond remedy and the destruction of good would be irrevocable: this is what we mean by the word Hell.”50 Hell is the lot of the lost!

Purgatory, Contested Reality
There is still an aspect of salvation which we have to consider, the aspect of those who left this world in imperfect friendship with God. What happens to those persons who are not pure enough to see God and not wicked enough to receive the eternal damnation? Those at Level One fail to grapple with this reality of “saved but not yet”. They glibly overlook this hard fact and condemn the Catholic Church, the Mother and Teacher who teaches that an intermediate stage exists until the end of times. That intermediate stage on the path of salvation is called Purgatory. The usual gambit comes: “Is it in the Bible?” Well, I must grant it to such an interlocutor that the word purgatory is not in the Bible. But the reality of Purgatory is in the Bible! The locus classicus for the doctrine of Purgatory is 2 Maccabees 12:38-46. The sacred writers justified and praised the action of Judas Maccabeus in collecting money for sacrifice for the fallen soldiers, “an action altogether fine and noble, prompted by his belief in the resurrection. For had he not expected the fallen to rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead, whereas if he had in view the splendid recompense reserved for those who make a pious end, the thought was holy and devout. Hence, he had this expiatory sacrifice offered for the dead, so that they might be released from their sin”.

Purgatory, the Gift of a Second Chance
The human heart longs for a second chance. There was this lady who phoned me and demanded frantically if it was true that the Church had abolished Purgatory. Of course I replied in the negative. She was happy. She did not want to go to Hell. It was likely that she was not ready for the straight flight to heaven. She needed a stopover. On 2nd November, 2008, I called her and reminded her that that day was All Souls' Day, the day the Church dedicates to the dead, to all “who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven”. 51 I was expecting her to be happy but she was rather disturbed. The reason was that the preacher said that those who committed mortal sin would not go to Purgatory! I was surprised at her reaction. Did she not know that before? Purgatory is not for those burdened with mortal sin, the eternally damned but for those who have minor sins (venial sins, sins that are not deadly (1 John 5:16-17) and those who have yet to complete the satisfaction for mortal sins already forgiven by God. Every sin has at least two consequences: eternal and temporal. Take for example the case of the sins of David. The eternal consequence was death. When he repented, Prophet Nathan pronounced the absolution: “You shall not die” (You shall not suffer the eternal punishment due to your sins) but three temporal consequences were pronounced: death of the child, murderous incidents in David's household and flagrant sexual abuse of David's wives (see 2 Sam. 12:1-15). The temporal punishment is expiated in this world or in the world to come.

Purgatory, not in but in the Bible
The scriptural basis of this important teaching of the Church is solid. Solid is also the constant teaching of the Fathers of the Church and of the Church's magisterium. Jesus gives a hint that some sins can still be forgiven in the age to come (see Matt. 12:32). St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians stated that some persons would be saved “but only as through fire” (1 Cor. 3:15). He talked about being baptised on behalf of the dead in view of eternal resurrection (1 Cor. 15:29). The teaching of the Catholic Church is unassailable. The Church gave the name Purgatory to the reality that is in the Scriptures and in the Sacred Tradition, the stage or state or place of final purification of the elect , which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned.52 This teaching is supported by the practice of praying for the dead. The wonder is that those Christians who deny the existence of Purgatory pray for the dead. I had a very interesting discussion with a member of the Anglican Communion. It was on All Souls' Day. I told her that we had Masses for the dead. She sort of said that that was the practice of Catholics and their Purgatory. I asked if she believed in Purgatory. The answer was of course “no”. I asked further if she ever prays for the dead. She replied that she continued to pray for her father who had died many years ago. Why was she praying for her father who died many years ago? If he was in Heaven, no need to pray for him. If he was in Hell, too late and unnecessary to pray for him. This is a classical case of Level One. Denying the existence of Purgatory against the solid indications of the scriptures, the constant evidence of Sacred Tradition, the consistent teaching of the Catholic Church and the common practice of all Christians of praying for the dead makes no sense. The simple fact is that those who deny the existence of Purgatory do so on nominalistic grounds: the word is not found in the Bible!

Purgatory is the gift of the merciful and compassionate God, the God who does not want the death of a sinner but continues to give the sinner opportunities to repent and live for ever. The process continues in life on earth as the Church surrounds the believer with means of coming back to God to live and after death with suffrages to obtain God's cleansing mercy for the dead who died in a state that does not warrant eternal death but cannot lead to a direct and immediate Beatific vision. Purgatory is a necessity of mercy. The God of a second chance offers this half-way station that challenges us to come to the aid of our brothers and sisters in the Communion of Saints. The Catholic Church, the pillar and mainstay of truth, armed with the complete truth into which the Holy Spirit has led her and continues to lead her, accepts the gift of Purgatory while the arrogant and presumptuous persons notionally reject the half-way station but practically recognise its existence by praying for the dead. The Catholic Church has always honoured “the memory of the dead and offered prayers in suffrage for them, above all the Eucharistic sacrifice, so that thus purified, they may attain the beatific vision. The Church also commends almsgiving, indulgences and works of penance undertaken on behalf of the dead”.53

The Testimony of Pope Benedict XVI
I add the current testimony of Pope Benedict XVI to those of the cloud of witnesses to the reality of Purgatory: “The belief that love can reach into the afterlife, that reciprocal giving and receiving is possible, in which our affection for one another continues beyond the limits of death, this is the fundamental conviction of Christianity throughout the ages and it remains a source of comfort today”.54 Yes, Purgatory is an expression and an opportunity for the continued solicitude for the salvation of our brothers and sisters. “So my prayer for another is not something extraneous to that person, something external, not even after death. In the interconnectedness of Being, my gratitude to the other, my prayer for him can play a small part in his purification” (ibid.) We need to include others in our prayers both for those here on earth with me on the pilgrimage to our eternal homeland and those who have crossed the frontiers of death.

Is it Finished for Me?
Am I saved? Yes, Christ has saved me on the cross. It is finished! Consummatum est! Yet, I have to work out and make this salvation mine with fear and trembling in the Church, making use of the means of truth and sanctification made available to me in the Church and live the life of love. The repentant thief crucified with Jesus heard the words of salvation: “In truth I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). At the end of my earthly life, I expect the glad news of salvation: “Come, you whom my Father has blessed, take as your heritage the kingdom prepared for you since the foundation of the world” (Matt. 25:33-34). Then I am definitvely and irrevocably and eternally saved! Then I will be able to join the saints in singing the new hymn to the Lamb who saved me: “You are worthy to take the scroll and to break its seals, because you were sacrificed, and with your blood you bought people for God of every race, language, people and nation and made them a line of kings and priests for God to rule the world” (Rev. 5:9-10). I will be in the new heaven and new earth and the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride for her husband, where God lives among human beings. He will make his home among them; they will be his people, and he will be their God, God-with-them. He will wipe away all tears from their eyes; there will be no more death, and no more mourning or sadness or pain (see (Rev. 21:1-4). This is my hope! And this is my hope also for others. As Pope Benedict XVI wrote: “Our hope is always essentially also a hope for others; only thus is it truly hope for me too. As Christians we should never limit ourselves to asking: how can I save myself? We should also ask: what can I do in order that others may be saved and that for them too the star of hope may rise? Then I will have done my utmost for my personal salvation as well”.