See also: Purgatory (homonymy)

According to the Catholic Theology , the purgatory is a process of purification of the heart after the Mort and which follows the particular Jugement, and almost everyone passes there before entering to the Ciel fault of being itself concerned about repair the caused damage of alive sound.

Catholic theology

Since the birth of the Catholic church, the Christians present to God prayers in favor of their deaths; one finds trace of sacrifices offered in favor of deaths in the Jewish Bible but the fate of the people deceased was not clearly established.

A confusion is often made between the perfection of a heart and the fact that all its scars are unobtrusive. Each sin generates a wound with the heart whereas each act of love increases its perfection.

The perfection can increase only because the people have their free will to pose acts of love or acts of hatred (sins), after death, the heart loses the use of its free will, it is not thus more question for it of progressing in perfection, it like is statufiée with the degrees of love or hatred which it reached during its existence

The wounds caused by the sins are erasable during the life by: the prayer, alms, the fast, the acts body penitence, the desire of going to the sky, a great devotion to his/her brothers, a great love for the others, and finally by sadness and the interior regret to have made these sins " if I could I would retrogress and would not make these actes" , most important being to regret not by compassion on oneself but by love of Jesus. All these acts erase the harmful consequences of the sin, which theology names " the sorrow due for the péché." If the people did not work to repair of the their alive wrong which they caused by their sins, the purgatory exerts a purifying action by the fire and the state of nonvision of God, who is a suffering incomparably acuter than the action of fire.

For the Christian catholic, the Purgatoire (of the Latin purgare , “to purify, clean”) indicates the whole of the means by which the heart S died in a state of grace but not yet entirely purified consequences of their sins, reaches the direct vision of God, vision which causes an infinite and eternal pleasure, " the paradis" , or " the ciel"

The word indicating the purgatory place was unknown before the 11th century but not what it indicates: one of the first documents to mention this name is a letter of the Bénédictin Nicolas de Saint-Alban with the Cistercien Pierre of That in 1176 (Haggh, 1997).

One of the oldest testimonys is the account of the passion of Perpetuates and Congratulated: in prison Perpétue sees in dream his/her young brother died before it, to leave a dark well, following this dream, it will offer prayers for him and then another dream will show it happy " I live that it had been withdrawn from its peine" (cf Jacques Le Goff, Birth of the Purgatory , Gallimard, coll “Folio”, Paris, 1991 (1st edition 1981) ISBN 2-07032-644-6, p.74-75 If the localization of the purgatory did not obstruct the first Christians, nor the fact of having a name to indicate this place, reality to help by the prayers and the asceticism the late ones is clearly established as of Christian antiquity

Gregoire de Nysse (4th century):

“ When it left its body and that the difference between the virtue and the defect is known it cannot approach God before the fire of purification removed the spots whose its heart was infested. This same fire at others will erase the corruption of the matter and the inclination with the evil. ”

“ Some only undergoes temporal punishments in this life, some after death, for some before and after, but all before the last judgment, most rigorously carried out. But those which undergo temporal punishments after death will not incur all the eternal punishments, which must follow this judgment. ”

Was a concise explanation of the catholic doctrines on the Purgatory presented by the cardinal Julien Cesarini to the Orthodoxe Orientaux fathers assembled to the Council of Ferrara-Florence, at the time of Session VI, in June (1438?) :

“As of the time of the Apôtre S” it has says, “the Catholic church taught that the hearts started from this world, pure and frank of very sinned - i.e. hearts of the Saint S - enter the happiness immediately. The hearts of those which after their Baptême sinned, but which then sincerely repented and acknowledged their sins, though incompetents to carry out l'epitimia prescribed by the confessor, or to bring fruits of repentance sufficient for expier their sins, these hearts are purified by the fire of the purgatory, sometimes quickly, sometimes more slowly, according to their sins; and then, after their purification, they leave for the places happiness eternal. The prayers of the priest, the offices liturgical and the acts of charity contribute in a great measurement to their purification. The hearts of those which died in the mortal sin, or in the original sin, go directly to the damnation.”

A canonical decree containing similar doctrines is incorporated in the “Decree of Union” written before the fence of the Concile of Florence, which had given a short moment the hope to put an end to the Great Schism of the East.

A development of the doctrines on the Purgatory was found thereafter in the guns of the Concile of Thirty (Session XXV), which thought of being able to draw the idea from Purgatory “of the Scriptures and the old tradition of the Pères taught in the Councils. ” The Protestant Churches reject almost all this design. (see below).

The catechism for adults , published by the Conference of the bishops of France in 1991 with the agreement of the Congregation for the doctrines of the faith which gave the January 23rd 1991 the approval of the the Holy See, indicates simply what follows:

" … to arrive to this contemplation of God, a " étape" of purification, called purgatory, can be necessary. It is neither about a place, nor of a time; one can speak rather about a state. In any case, the purgatory, which is well a sorrow, is not to conceive like a punishment, by which God would be avenged to some extent for our inaccuracies. The communion with God, into which death introduces us, makes us become aware painfully our imperfections and our refusal to like, and need to let to us purify by the saving power of Christ.

It is God itself which purifies and transforms. But the Tradition of the Catholic church affirms that those which are with the purgatory profit from the prayers and the supplications addressed in their favor to God by their brothers, and also of the intercession of the saints already introduced into the bliss of the vision of God ".

Protestant/evangelic theology

The Christian churches resulting from the Reform (Lutheran, calvinist), as well as the evangelic , reject the existence of the purgatory since it is not quoted by name in the Bible. Indeed, fire represents the judgment in the Writings, which is single, i.e. reserved for each man only once, and at the conclusion which God accepts it or not in his presence (Hebrew 9:27).

But the preparation for this judgment is done only during the life on ground, by the faith (sola fide). After death, plus nothing can be changed. cf 2 Pierre 3:7 - 14. Verse 9 " The Lord (...) uses of patience towards you not wanting that no perishes, but wanting that all arrive at the repentance."

The day of the judgment is also called the day of the anger of God, which one can be saved only by the justice, which is obtained by the faith in work rédemptrice of Christ. cf Proverbs 11:4 " For the day of anger, the richness is not used with nothing. but justice delivers mort."

See too

Although the technical name of " Purgatoire" that is to say absent from the Bible, as well as that of " Trinité" , of many passages of the Scriptures evoke the existence of a purifying fire intervening after body death. See for example:

1Corinthiens 3: 12 Gold, if somebody builds on this base with gold, money, invaluable stones, wood, hay, thatch, the 13 work of each one will be expressed; because the day will make known it, because it will appear in fire, and fire will test what is the work of each one. 14 If the work built by somebody on the base remains, it will receive a reward. 15 If the work of somebody is consumed, it will lose its reward; for him, it will be saved, but as through fire. 16 don't you know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 17 If somebody destroys the temple of God, God will destroy it; because the temple of God is holy, and it is what you are.

The book of Maccabées (allowed only in the catholic gun) also speaks about a sacrifice achieved in favor of late, which implies the existence of a place of purification distinct from the Hell and Paradise.

2Maccabées 12:43 Then, having made a collection of approximately 2.000 drachmas, it sent it to Jerusalem so that one offered a sacrifice for the sin, acting extremely well and noblement according to the concept of resurrection. 44 Because, if he had not hoped that the fallen soldiers dussent ressusciter, he were superfluous and stupid to request for deaths, 45 and if he considered that a very beautiful reward is reserved for those who fall asleep in piety, it was a holy and pious thought there. For this reason it made make this expiatory sacrifice for deaths, so that they were delivered of their sin.

As for the Gospel of Matthieu, it evokes the possibility of “sins given” in the other world, i.e. after death:

Matthieu 12: 32 Whoever will speak against the Son of man, it will be forgiven to him; but whoever will speak against the Holy Spirit, it will be forgiven to him neither in this century nor in the century to come.

Purgatory and economic context of the Middle Ages

The passage by the purgatory as from the XII century allowed the development of the trade (thanks to the loan with interest) in the Christian world, before that, wear was regarded as a mortal sin. The usurers thus expiaient their faults (wear) before being able to join the Paradise (they were not systematically any more condemned to the hell), from where appearance of the concept of venial sin. See