On Fire???

I don’t know about you, but the way so many people speak about purgatory makes me so scared and terrified. Some intend and insist to remind us about the fire and pain in purgatory.

As if the pain in this life is not enough, some even have said to me that the pain of purgatory and the fires are more intense than that of hell and they conclude “but it’s okay, you will end up in heaven”.

Others remind me as if they are looking at some sort of checklist, that this particular sin corresponds to certain hours in this “place” called purgatory. And even some give you an impression that this suffering can go forever and then if God is not happy with you and you don’t pass the test, then he will send you to hell.

I don’t want to write an article to defend the Church teaching on purgatory. I agree with the Church. I also understand that some of these beliefs have been in influenced by Private Revelations and visions, but I must say that I really struggle with these analogies.

So be patient with me as I try to clarify and perhaps provide a better analogy (although still limited) about this “state” or “condition” and not a physical place the Church calls purgatory. A new way to look at the transformative nature of purgatory. For this I will refer to Pope Benedict’s Encyclical, “Spe Salvi”.

The word purgatory means to make clean or purify and according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church it is a “purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven,” which is experienced by those “who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified” (CCC 1030).
Purgatory, therefore is a state of preparation for heaven so we “become fully open to receiving God and able to take our place at the table of the eternal marriage-feast” (Benedict XVI).

The Pope Emeritus continues and gives us an analogy. He writes: “Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire (in purgatory) 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”.

But one must ask, what is so painful about this? Pope Benedict continues and writes: “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’.”

This pain is the pain of love. Benedict calls it “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… The pain of love becomes our salvation and our joy.”

What about the question of time, how long? The Pope Emeritus writes: “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”.

I beg of you to read this again. Such deep insights.

Let me humbly simplify and provide a limited analogy from our everyday life. Have you ever hurt someone deeply? Someone who sacrificed so much for you and loves you. Have you been unfaithful to them? Have you ever let your mum, dad, brother, sister, husband, wife or friend, down so badly?

And if this did happen, have you stood in front of them so ashamed wanting to say sorry and you cannot even look them in the eye? Just imagine, if this happened to you, how would you feel? The pain and shame?

This is just an example, as we stand in front of Christ, ashamed of our sins. The pain of realising that I have let down the one who gave his life away for me and I have not had the time or was too hardened of heart on earth, to say sorry. Or I did not have time to make up for the mistake (I did not do Penance). How ashamed must one feel? How painful it is?

This is the Blessed pain of purgatory. Let us not be afraid. It it God, our Father who will be our judge. My dad will judge me! Justly but mercifully! And his Son who gave his life for me will help me prepare for this moment and his Spirit will be with me.

This is indeed the blessed pain, the pain of hope, the transformative pain of purgatory.