FACT CHECK! Divine Sources for the Dogma of Purgatory
Psalm 137, as quoted from the Office for the Dead (Officium Pro Defunctis):
I will confess to thee O Lord in my whole heart: because thou hast heard the words of my mouth. In the sight of Angels I will sing to thee: I will adore toward thy holy temple, and will confess to thy name. Upon thy mercy and thy truth: because thou hast magnified thy holy name above all things. In what day soever I shall call on thee, hear me: thou shalt multiply strength in my soul.
Let all the Kings of the earth O Lord confess to thee: because they have heard all the words of thy mouth. And let them sing in the ways of our Lord: because great is the glory of our Lord. Because our Lord is high, and he beholdeth low things: and high things he knoweth far off.
If I shall walk in the midst of tribulation, thou wilt quicken me: and upon the wrath of mine enemies thou hast extended thy hand, and thy right hand hath saved me. Our Lord will repay for me, O Lord thy mercy is forever: despise not the works of thy hands. Eternal rest give unto them O Lord: and let perpetual light shine unto them.
Ant: The works of thy hands despise not O Lord.
V: I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me.
R: Blessed are the dead which die in our Lord.
Purgatory is a dogma of the Christian Religion. This means it is an infallible teaching, revealed by God to His Church through Divine Revelation. The Protestants have tried to deceive us into thinking it is not rooted in Sacred Scripture. The Modernists have tried to deceive us by asserting universal salvation, that is that just about everyone goes to Heaven. Meanwhile, our loved ones in Purgatory need us to remember them in our prayers, sacrifices, sufferings, rosaries, and Mass offerings. They are dependent on us for help, and in return, they pray for us as well.
The word “Purgatory” is not found in the pages of the Bible. Of course, neither are the terms “Trinity,” “Hypostatic Union,” or “Incarnation.” And yet, all these are dogmas of the Christian Religion. Purgatory is a temporal place for those who die in a state of grace, yet still attached to venial sins and having not made the necessary penances and reparation for absolved mortal sins.
The reason for this is because we are called to grow in grace and holiness. 1 Peter 1:16 teaches, “Because it is written: You shall be holy, for I am holy.” 2 Peter 3:18 states, “Grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” St. John, referencing Heaven, writes in Apocalypse 21:27, “There shall not enter into it any thing defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they that are written in the book of life of the Lamb.”
There are those who die without mortal sin on their souls (so they will not be going to Hell), and yet they are not fully prepared for the glories of Heaven, wherein we see God face to face. Hebrews 12:14 tells us to “strive… for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” Even Moses, the meekest man on the face of the Earth, was cautioned to not look directly at God’s face (Exodus 33:18-20).
While attachment to even venial sin deprives us of the vision of God, in His great mercy He disciplines and purges us to prepare us for the wedding banquet of Heaven. Just as any good father ought to train and teach their misbehaved or wayward child in order to help form them into an upstanding citizen when they grow older, so too, Purgatory is an act of God’s grace. Rather than condemning us outright for one sin, He is patient with us and is preparing us for Heaven. If we are able to receive that discipline in this life, all the better. But for the one who dies that has not fully received it, then God continues His work in Purgatory, where we are cleansed of any traces of venial sins and vices that are attached to us.
Hebrews 12 states, “For whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he acknowledges… but he does so for our benefit, in order that we may share his holiness.” In the Old Testament, Isaiah the prophet feared seeing God because of his sinfulness, so God purged him in order for Isaiah to see him. “Then I said, “Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Then one of the seraphim flew to me, holding an ember which he had taken with tongs from the altar. He touched my mouth with it. “See,” he said, “now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged” (Isaiah 5:6-7).
In 1 Peter 4:12-13, our first Pope even compares the discipline of the Lord to a fiery trial. “Dearly beloved, think not strange the burning heat which is to try you, as if some new thing happened to you; But if you partake of the sufferings of Christ, rejoice that when his glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy.” Earlier in the same letter, St. Peter compares the testing of our faith to gold being tested by fire. “The genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire, may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7).
The most explicit passage teaching the truth of Purgatory comes to us in 1 Corinthians 3:11-17. St. Paul is writing about the day of judgment for the Christian. In verse 14 he speaks about those whose works pass through the fire because they used precious jewels to build upon the foundation of Christ, and that person goes to Heaven. In verse 17, he speaks about those who destroy the temple, and that person is then destroyed by God in Hell. However, in between those two, there is another person mentioned in verse 15:
“If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.”
In the same way the works go through the fire, so too does the worker. The Greek is clear on this. The works being discussed (wood, hay, and straw) are sins. This is the whole context of 1 Corinthians chapters 1-3. Divisions, gossip, quarrels. Bad works, otherwise known as sins, are being referred to. The man who builds with precious stones receives a reward. This is Heaven. The man who destroys the temple is also destroyed. This is Hell. In between these two individuals is the worker who builds his house on wood, hay, and straw. His works pass through the fire, he suffers loss (“Suffers loss” in Greek is the exact same word used for “punished”), he will be saved, yet so as (Greek for “yet so as” is literally “in the same way” or “likewise” as the works passed through the fire) through fire.
So, 1 Corinthians 3:15 can literally be interpreted, “If any man’s work burns, he shall be punished or disciplined; he himself shall be saved, likewise as going through the same fire his works went through.” And this is speaking on the day of judgment, after the man dies. So here we see an explicit proof for the doctrine of Purgatory taught right in Sacred Scripture.
We also have an explicit proof right from the Old Testament, in 2 Maccabees 12:42-46, which teaches the value of praying for the dead. Unfortunately, the Protestants uprooted this book from the Bible because it did not fit their theological framework. “Turning to supplication, they prayed that the sinful deed might be fully blotted out. The noble Judas warned the soldiers to keep themselves free from sin, for they had seen with their own eyes what had happened because of the sin of those who had fallen. He then took up a collection among all his soldiers, amounting to two thousand silver drachmas, which he sent to Jerusalem to provide for an expiatory sacrifice. In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the fallen to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin.”
Excavations of the catacombs from the 1st century where Christians hid from persecution demonstrate the belief in apostolic times of praying for deceased loved ones, showing that they were taught this by the Apostles themselves. A beautiful testimony to Sacred Tradition. In the 2nd century, Tertullian wrote about the practice of praying for the dead. St. Clement of Alexandria wrote, “By punishment after death, men must expiate the least sin before they can enter Heaven.” Origen taught, “all souls are purified by fire before they enter Heaven, unless they are so pure as not to need it.” In the 3rd century, we have St. Cyprian teaching, “It is one thing to be cast into prison not to be released until the last farthing is paid, and another thing through the ardor of faith immediately to attain to the reward.” On and on it goes in the early church. Ambrose, Augustine, Basil the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus, John Chrysostom, etc. etc. All Saints and defenders against heresies, and they all taught praying for the dead and a place of purgation after this life for those not yet fully prepared for Heaven.
The Council of Trent dogmatically declared, “We constantly hold that purgatory exists, and that the souls of the faithful there detained are helped by the prayers of the faithful… If anyone says that after the grace of justification has been received the guilt is so remitted and the debt of eternal punishment so blotted out for any repentant sinner, that no debt of temporal punishment remains to be paid, either in this world or in the other, in purgatory, before access can be opened to the kingdom of heaven, let him be anathema.”
We also have the testimony of the Mystics. St. Bridget received apparitions and messages from Our Lady, Mother Mary, who addressed herself as, “Mother of the Souls in Purgatory, the Mother of all those who are in the place of expiation.” Our Queen went on to reveal, “My prayers mitigate the chastisements inflicted on sinners for their faults.” Our Lord revealed to St. Margaret of Cortona, “The pains they endure are very great, but would be incomparably greater if they were not visited and consoled by My Angels, the sight of whom comforts them in their sufferings and refreshes them in their purification.”
20th century mystic Maria Simma received visitations from the Poor Souls for decades. It is worth noting that our family in Purgatory are also known as the Church Suffering, whereas we on Earth are the Church Militant, and our family in Heaven are the Church Triumphant. She wrote a book called “Get Us Out of Here” which details at length all of her experiences with the Poor Souls. When asked, “What is Purgatory,” here was her response:
“What exactly is Purgatory? I’d say that it’s a marvelous invention of God. Let me give you an image which is my own. Suppose that one day a door opens, and a splendid being appears, extremely beautiful, of a beauty that has never been seen on earth. You are fascinated, overwhelmed by this being of light and beauty, even more so that this being shows that he is madly in love with you — you have never dreamed of being loved so much. You sense too that he has a great desire to draw you to him, to be one with you. And the fire of love which burns in your heart impels you to throw yourself into his arms. But wait — you realize at this moment that you haven’t washed for months and months, that you smell bad; you nose is running, your hair is greasy and matted, there are big dirty stains on your clothes, etc. So you say to yourself, “No, I just can’t present myself in this state. First I must go and wash: a good shower, then straight away I’ll come back.”
But the love which has been born in your heart is so intense, so burning, so strong, that this delay for the shower is absolutely unbearable. And the pain of the absence, even if it only lasts for a couple of minutes, is an atrocious wound in the heart, proportional to the intensity of the revelation of the love — it is a “love-wound”.
Purgatory is exactly this. It’s a delay imposed by our impurity, a delay before God’s embrace, a wound of love which causes intense suffering, a waiting, if you like, a nostalgia for love. It is precisely this burning, this longing which cleanses us of whatever is still impure in us. Purgatory is a place of desire, a made desire for God, desire for this God whom we already know, for we have seen him, but with whom we are not yet united.”
