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DEVOTION TO THE SOULS
IN PURGATORY
SPECIAL TOPIC FOR NOVEMBER
 Devotion to the Souls in Purgatory

What happens What is Purgatory? A manifestation

after Death? of God’s merciful love

No one is alone The Church’s Common What are indulgences?

in the path of conversion “Spiritual Treasury”

What are suffrages? Examples of partially Examples of works

indulgenced works with plenary indulgences
 What happens
after death?
The Particular Judgment
◦ Right after death, each man in his immortal soul receives his
eternal retribution – either heaven (immediately or after a period
of purification), or hell.
CCC 1021-1022

◦ “At the evening of our life,

we shall be judged on our love.”
St. John of the Cross

◦ “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God,

and God abides in him.”
1 Jn 4:16
◦ those who die in sanctifying grace,
with charity in their hearts, go to heaven

◦ those who die in mortal sin and bereft of charity, to hell.

 What is Purgatory?
State of final purification of those who die in sanctifying grace,
but with unforgiven venial sins and temporal punishment
due to forgiven mortal and venial sins.
CCC 1472

◦ God is pure light and love

not only the guilt of sin, but also any disordered attachment to creatures that sin leaves behind even
after the sin is forgiven,
must be rectified before one can see God as he is
1 Jn 3:1-3
CCC 1473

◦ in this life: by bearing patiently its sufferings and trials

1 Pt 6-7

◦ and by exercising oneself in prayer, penance,

and the corporal and spiritual works of mercy  to conquer the “three lusts”
1 Jn 2:16

◦ in the next: offering the purifying fire and pains of Purgatory

as atonement for our sins.
Mt 5:21-26; 12:32
 A manifestation
of God’s merciful love
◦ God, like a mother giving her baby a good bath and powdering him,
then filling him with kisses before bedtime.
St. Josemaria

◦ “Purgatory shows God’s great mercy and washes away the defects
of those who long to become one with Him.”
Furrow 889

◦ with the fire of charity in the hearts of those in Purgatory, God bestows grace on them
to offer acts of perfect contrition for the vestiges of sin that keep them
from being totally united to Him.
Cf. CCC 1472. Lk 23:43

◦ the suffering in Purgatory is completely different from those suffered by the damned.
A deep, painful sorrow filled with love, hope and peace.

◦ “You should want to do things to gain merit, nor out of fear of the punishments
of purgatory. From now on…always make the effort to do everything,
even the smallest things, to please Jesus.”
The Forge 1041
 No one is alone
in the path
of conversion
The mystery of the Communion of Saints
◦ “The life of each of God’s children is joined in and through Christ…to the
life of all the other Christian brethren in the supernatural unity of the
Mystical Body of Christ, as in a single mystical person.”
CCC 1474
Cf. 1 Cor 12; Eph 4; Gal 3:27-28

◦ A perennial link of charity exists between the saints in heaven, those

expiating their sins in purgatory,
and those still on pilgrimage on earth. All “cleave together”
in the one Body of Christ through the Holy Spirit.
CCC 1475
◦ an “abundant exchange of all good things exists between them.”
◦ ”the holiness of one profits others,
well beyond the harm that the sin of one could cause others”
Cf. Rom 5:20

◦ “recourse to the communion of saints lets the contrite sinner

be more promptly and efficaciously purified of the punishments for sin”.
 The Church’s Common
“Spiritual Treasury”
Communion of saints, like a “joint bank account”

◦ deriving, first of all, from the infinite merits of the Death of Jesus, in
whom all the merits of the blessed find their ultimate source.

◦ the prayers and good works of the of the Blessed Virgin Mary
--“immense, unfathomable and pristine in value before God”;

◦ the prayers and good works of all the saints in heaven

and of the souls in Purgatory

◦ the prayers and good works of all on earth

who struggle to live in the faith and love of Christ.
Cf. CCC 1476-1477

The saints in heaven and the souls in Purgatory pray for us, while
we pray for one another and for the souls in Purgatory.
What are
indulgences?
◦ A remission of the temporal punishment due to forgiven mortal and
venial sins that the Church,
by virtue of Her power to bind and loose
(cf. Mt 16:19; 18:18) and of the common treasury
of reparative grace and merit in the Communion of Saints,
grants to those who, with a spirit of charity and contrition, perform
certain indulgenced works

◦ They may be partial or plenary according as it removes either part or

all of the temporal punishment due to sin.

◦ They may be applied to the living and to the dead.

Cf. CCC 1471,1478

◦ Enchiridion Indulgentiarum
– list of all the indulgenced works of devotion, penance and charity
 What are
suffrages?
Prayers (especially the Sacrifice of the Mass),
acts of penance, works of charity, almsgiving,
and indulgences that we offer for those in Purgatory

◦ Those in Purgatory can no longer merit an increase in charity as they

atone for the temporal punishment of their sins.
(Analogy: red and white blood cells of our bodies in healing body injuries and
infections.)

◦ But the acts of charity and atonement that the members

of the Church on earth offer on their behalf hasten
their period of final purification.
(Analogy: blood transfusion: TW 544.)

Cf. Col 1:24; CCC 954, 958

◦ Offering suffrages is a salutary means

to live the Communion of Saints
and to grow in faith, hope and charity,
especially in the month of November.
Cf. CCC 1024
 Examples of partially indulgenced works

Lifting our minds and hearts to freely abstaining

rendering some act bearing witness to our faith in
God while performing from something licit
of service or charity the different circumstances of
our daily duties and pleasant
to others daily life
or facing some contradiction in a spirit of penance

the degree of remission of temporal punishment

depends on the quality of our charity
and spirit of penance
 Examples of works
with plenary indulgences

Adoration of the Eucharist The pious exercise Recitation of the Rosary in church,
for at least half an hour of the Way of the Cross in a family, or with a group of people

Piously reading or listening Taking part for at least 3 full days

to Scripture for at least half an hour in a spiritual retreat
The plenary indulgence attached
to the Apostolic Blessing that a priest
is to impart when giving the sacraments
to one in danger of death, and which,
if no priest is available, the Church grants
to any rightly disposed Christian at the moment of
death, on condition that he/she
was accustomed to saying some prayers
during life.

In this case, the Church Herself makes up

for the three conditions normally required
for a plenary indulgence:
 Sacramental Confession
 Eucharistic Communion,
 and Prayer for the Pope’s intentions.
DEVOTION TO THE SOULS
IN PURGATORY
SPECIAL TOPIC FOR NOVEMBER