Catholic teaching about the life beyond this life.

Many religious people don't dare point out how dubious the beliefs of other religions may be, for fear that their own beliefs will be subjected to the same scrutiny.  Far from fearing such scrutiny, however, "Liberals Like Christ" invite it.  Thanks to criticism and arguments with our readers we have corrected and improved our views in the past and look forward to doing so again and again in the future.         But where the Catholic Church is concerned, despite the fact that neither science, history, personal experience nor "revelation" provide any reliable information about the world beyond the one we are all in now, "Holy Mother the Church" has claimed for ages to know all kinds of things about what happens to people after they die.  In this page, we will explore what the church claims to know about Purgatory, Indulgences, Limbo, and the "assumption" of Mary's body into heaven.

Purgatory & Indulgences :         The grounds for belief in a "Purgatory" are not scriptural, but pastoral.   How many times could clergy tell people that their departed loved ones who had succumbed to any of the endless catalogue of mortal sins and had not repented and confessed their sins to a priest in time were in hell and would be staying there for eternity?  People had prayed for the departed for ages, not because they knew it would help, but because that was all that they could do for the departed.  Eventually, hope - which some might call "wishful thinking" - gave rise to the idea that the virtue and the prayers of the living could make up for the sinful lives of the departed.  There was something between heaven and hell where your loved ones would go, if they were too sinful for heaven but not quite sinful enough for hell.  Thanks to the discovery of "Purgatory", the clergy could now comfort many of the faithful with the hope that there was a second chance for their loved ones and that even if they had missed the boat while on earth, they could be saved through the prayers and good works of their survivors.         The following is from the book, Vicars of Christ, by a former Jesuit professor at Gregorian University in Rome, Peter DeRosa:         "It was in the area of indulgences that (Pope) Sixtus showed a touch of genius. He was the first pontiff to decide that they could be applied to the dead. Even he was overwhelmed by their popularity. Here was an infinite source of revenue that even his greediest predecessors had not dreamed of. It was breathtaking in its implications: the pope, creature of flesh and blood, had power over the regions of the dead. Souls in torment for their misdemeanours could be released by his word, provided their pious relatives dipped into.their pockets. And which of them wouldn't if they had a spark of Christian decency? Widows and widowers, bereaved parents spent their all trying to get their loved ones out of Purgatory, painted in ever more lurid colours.         Praying for the dead was one thing, paying for them another. Simple folk were led to believe that the pope, or those who came to their village and sold the pope's pardon, guaranteed their dead would go to heaven on the wings of indulgences. The potential for abuse was considerable. The sale of relics from the tenth century had been bad enough. . . Martyr's bones, like oil, were not a renewable commodity, but indulgences were limitless and could be priced to suit every pocket. Nothing was required of the donor or recipient, not love or compassion or prayer or repentance - only money. No practice was ever more irreligious than this. The pope grew rich in the measure that the poor were duped."         Purgatory had no justification, whether in Scripture or in logic. Its real basis was papal avarice. An Englishman, Simon Fish, in A Supplicacyion for the Beggars, written in the year 1529, was to point that out irrefutably:     'There is not one word spoken of it in all holy Scripture, and also if the Pope with his pardons may for money deliver one soul hence, he may deliver him as well without money.  If he may deliver one, he may deliver a thousand: if he may deliver a thousand, he may deliver them all; and so destroy purgatory.  And then he is a cruel tyrant, without all charity, if he keep them there in prison and in pain, till men will give him money.' " from CatholicArrogance.Org/Catholic/PopesvsChrist-2.html The Catholic Church is still promoting Indulgences [ From http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=34637 Plenary indulgences for Year of the Eucharist Vatican, Jan. 14, 2001  (CWNews.com) - Pope John Paul II (bio - news) has granted a plenary indulgence for Catholics who participate in veneration of the Blessed Sacrament during the Year of the Eucharist. He has also granted a plenary indulgence to those who recite Vespers and Night Prayers before the tabernacle.                 These indulgences were announced by the Vatican on January 14. The formal decree granting the indulgences was dated December 25-- Christmas Day-- and issued by the Apostolic Penitentiary. Cardinal James Francis Stafford, the penitentiary major, announced that the decree was approved by Pope John Paul II on December 17.         A plenary indulgence is the remission of all temporal punishment due to sin. The indulgences are subject to the usual conditions: that the individual seeking the indulgence must make a full sacramental Confession, be free from all attachment to sin, receive the Eucharist, and pray for the intentions of the Holy Father.         The decree notes that the faithful may obtain the indulgence "each and every time they participate attentively and piously in a sacred function or a devotional exercise undertaken in honor of the Blessed Sacrament, solemnly exposed and conserved in the tabernacle." Similarly clerics, religious, and others who pray the Liturgy of the Hours can obtain the indulgence "each and every time they recite-- at the end of the day, in company or in private-- Vespers and Night Prayers before the Lord present in the tabernacle."         For those who "through illness or other just cause" cannot visit a church to venerate the Eucharist, the decree allows a plenary indulgence if they "make the visit spiritually and with the heart's desire,¦ and recite the Our Father and the Creed, adding a pious invocation to Jesus in the Sacrament."         The Apostolic Penitentiary instructs all pastors to inform Catholics about these indulgences "in the most convenient manner," and asks priest to be prepared to hear confessions and lead services of veneration in order to help the faithful receive the indulgences.         The decree also reiterates the Pope's instruction for local churches to make their own special plans for veneration of the Blessed Sacrament during the Year of the Eucharist. Official Catholic teaching on Original Sin Official Catholic teaching on Purgatory & Indulgences

Limbo now "in Limbo" ?         The following are two articles about an imaginary place made up by one great, canonized Catholic theologian, St. Thomas Aquinas, to save unbaptized babies from the damnation they had been assigned to by another great, canonized Catholic theologian, St. Augustine of Hippo.  Both articles were written by a former Jesuit who once taught at the prestigious Gregorian University in Rome who is also the author of the outstanding work on the papacy, Vicars of Christ, The dark side of the papacy, which I used as the principal source for the pages of my CatholicArrogance.Org/PopesvsChrist web pages.         (Since the publication of these articles several years ago, the author has been proven right by the actions of Pope Benedict XVI in 2007. WHERE HAVE ALL THE BABIES GONE? by Peter De Rosa         "Pope Benedict (XVI) is about to do a remarkable thing: kick Limbo into Limbo. [ See Oct. 6, 2006 BBC article].         Remember the old catechism? Limbo is that part of hell where unbaptised babies go when they die. Hell for babies? That always sounded harsh. Yet what choice did the Church have?         Traditionally, baptism is the essential gateway to heaven. Without it, St Augustine said, hell loomed. Though parents in the congregation shifted their feet and voiced their protests, he insisted that little babies had to suffer for ever because scripture said, "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven." King Herod would have licked his lips.         Augustine did make one concession. Babies suffered only the mildest punishment. Mind you, it was still absolutely awful because humans are made to see God and if they don't, their whole being suffers.         Eight centuries passed before St Thomas Aquinas came up with Limbo, a place of natural happiness for unbaptised babies who, by definition, had not committed any personal sin. For the next 700 years, Rome taught that Limbo is a kind of play centre for babies without any adult supervision. It was far more densely populated than heaven or hell.         I once entertained an elderly couple to dinner. Soon after their marriage, they'd had a stillborn child. In those days, unbaptised babies were not buried in the church graveyard but in scrubland with derelicts, heretics and murderers. When their priest tried to console them by saying at least their baby was happy in Limbo, they never went inside a church again.         One silver-haired lady told me that in her twenties her son had been stillborn. She was desolate. Even in winter she used to creep out of the house at night with a coat over her nightdress to kneel by her baby's grave to keep him warm.         When Pope Benedict was head of the Holy Office, he said of Limbo, "Personally, speaking as a theologian and not as head of the Congregation, I would drop something that has always been only a theological hypothesis."         In the New Catholic Catechism, he omitted all references to Limbo. God's mercy and Jesus' tenderness towards children "allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism". Now he is awaiting a report from a group of theologians who are said to be recommending that Limbo be officially dispensed with.         This has its problems. Rome teaches that a human being exists at the moment of conception. That human is tainted with original sin that can only be cleansed by baptism. What other mechanism is there for cleansing them of this sin?         John Paul spoke of abortion as murder. He intimated it was worse than murder because a human is killed without a chance of baptism and, therefore, with no hope of eternal life. Still, in 1995, he told women who had murdered their babies to beg their forgiveness. How could they forgive if they were not in the presence of the Lord?         Nearly 40 years ago, in a book called "Christ and Original Sin", I proposed a solution that some bishops called heretical. I suspect Rome will very soon adopt something like it.         We should think of original sin not as a personal but as a communal taint. All of us from birth are caught up in two universal realities. The first is the combined sin of the world, the second is the shared goodness of humankind. Babies are born into both. In baptism, they are officially enrolled in the zone of grace that Jesus called the Kingdom of God.         A baby who dies before baptism doesn't need it. He or she goes straight to God, for baptism is a sacrament of the living, not the dying. A baby dying without baptism doesn't die in original sin but out of original sin." GOODBYE, LIMBO, GOODBYE by Peter De Rosa         "The trouble with the Vatican, a priest said to me, is it's always changing its mind.         Take Limbo. Till recently it was very important. Now it has disappeared off the radar screen.         Small children were once warned of what to do if they came across a dying baby and no priest was present. They had to pour water over the little one's head while saying the baptismal words. If words and pouring were not simultaneous, the poor wee thing would go not to heaven, only to Limbo.         Doctors and nurses attending women in childbirth were told to baptise a baby in the womb if it was likely to die before birth, using a syringe.         A devout Catholic couple told me of their terror at the thought of their baby being run down by a car on the way to church for baptism. They'd never see him again in this life or the next.         Limbo was always a problem in the developing world when most babies died unbaptised. Rome simply said they could not be saved.         The situation worsened when geneticists found that perhaps three quarters of embryos are aborted without the woman knowing it. This meant, according to the Vatican, that most humans have to be snatched out of the drain by their guardian angels and transported to Limbo.         Now we're being told, without a word of apology to bereaved parents, that the popes got it all wrong for well over 1500 years. Why should we trust them any more?" Official Catholic teaching on Limbo

Assumption of Mary's body into Heaven         The Catholic Church doesn't simply claim to know that following the death of the mother of Jesus, Mary's earthly body was transported or "assumed" into heaven, but the Pope who declared this to be a fact, Pius IX, invoked his infallible authority to do so, a very, very rare occurrence.  And how did the Pope know this?  Apart from the fact that no one has yet stumbled over her body, the entire long-winded "proof" boils down to this: if the pope, or others who agree with him, were God's divine Son, that's what they would want for their mother.

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