(Grace MacKinnon is a syndicated columnist and public speaker on Catholic doctrine. Readers are welcome to submit questions about the Catholic faith to: Grace MacKinnon, 1234 Russell Drive #103, Brownsville, Texas 78520. Questions also may be sent by e-mail to: grace@deargrace.com. You may visit Grace online at www.DearGrace.com.)
State of Purification
Your questions are very good, and I thank you for writing in. The first thing I think we need to clarify is that your letter seems to imply that you see purgatory as some place apart from heaven or hell in which we “do time.” This is not what the Catholic Church teaches about purgatory. What we do teach is that “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. The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (CCC# 1030-1031).
Purgatory, therefore, is not a place apart from heaven. It is a state of purification, and all that are in this state are destined for heaven. In other words, in the afterlife, there are only two states in which one will live out eternity, and those are heaven and hell. Heaven will be that total communion with God in the Holy Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) and in the company of the angels, the saints, and all the blessed. Hell, on the other hand, will be the total and never-ending separation from God.
Separation from God
When a person dies, the body and soul separate. The body is buried (awaiting the final resurrection, when it will be re-united with the soul) and the soul continues its journey…to the state of heaven or hell. If the soul is in need of purification before it goes to meet God, it will first undergo the state of purgatory. How long this will be for, we do not know. Just as in heaven, in purgatory, there is no time, not as we know it here on earth. God’s time is not our time. The suffering or “fire” of purgatory is that the souls in this state know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God exists and want nothing more than to be with Him but cannot for a while. That is the tremendous pain…the separation from God, even for a short time.
Before Jesus’ coming, it was the understanding that all who had died went to the Netherworld, a sort of holding place in which there was a separation between the “damned” and the “just” (those who had died in God’s grace and friendship). This separation in the Netherworld is attested to in the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, which is found in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 16: 19-31. Both Lazarus and the rich man had gone to this place, but Lazarus was with the “just” (with Abraham) and the rich man with the “damned” because of the life he had lived. When he asks Abraham to have Lazarus bring him water, Abraham responds, “between you and us a great chasm is established to prevent anyone from crossing who might want to go from our side to yours or from your side to ours” (Luke 16:26).
Our Home is in Heaven
It was the “just” whom Jesus descended into the Netherworld to bring into heaven. We cannot know if any of them had to be purified before entering heaven. Perhaps some did. If they did not need this purification, then we can say they went straight to heaven. Keep in mind that while we speak of “going” to heaven, purgatory or hell, we are simply using words to help us describe a state of being and not a “place.”
Regarding your other question about someone who dies today. Can we say they have gone “home” even if they might have been in need of this purification? The answer is yes. This earth is not our real home; our home is in heaven, and those souls in the state of purgatory are indeed on their way there. We should remember the Holy Souls and know that when they reach that heavenly bliss, they will remember and pray for us in return.
