Hardly Worth Mentioning
There are so many competing concerns in the world today that deserve all of our time and attention, so I hope you will forgive this small rant that is certainly trivial in comparison. I mean, against the backdrop of multiple wars, a country divided, the threat to democracy, this is truly hardly worth mentioning. And, yet, somehow I cannot help but wonder.
In Catholic school, I was taught that, when you die, you go to Purgatory which is a place where you log in the required amount of time needed to burn off whatever number of sins you have accumulated between the time of your last confession and the time you stop breathing. Your friends on earth can say prayers designated to shorten your time in Purgatory. The primary get-out-of-Purgatory prayers are either Novenas or the Rosary. A Novena is a specific prayer said over nine consecutive days in order to get the saint to whom you are praying to grant whatever request you want - in this case, an early release date for your loved one’s soul in Purgatory. The Rosary is a prayer that is said using a string of beads with a crucifix attached to one end. The official purpose of this type of prayer is to keep in mind the 20 mysteries of history, but everyone I ever knew that prayed the Rosary, did so because they had some request that they wanted granted. I was taught that, once the correct number of people say the correct number of prayers, your soul is released from Purgatory.
I think of the purgatory equation something like this-
Sinner sins + death + Requiem Mass +Purgatory divided by Friend of sinner + prayers + time equals A Speedier Ascension into Heaven
AND there is a procedure to be followed - Step 1 - Sinner dies and is buried following a Requiem Mass. Step 2 - You, the friend, go to church some unspecified number of times and say some unknown number of prayers which then helps the soul of your loved one get into heaven faster.
Methods of praying for someone’s soul include any of the following - A celebration of mass in the name of your deceased friend, for which there is a cost because, well, you know the Catholics. They all but invented subscription access services.
Novena Prayers. These prayers, in theory, are the same prayer said for nine days in a row and they are to bring you peace and help you access “special graces” which in this case would be your friend’s speedy advent out of Purgatory.
The Rosary. Praying the Rosary involves prayer beads and a prescribed routine of Hail Mary’s, a couple of Our Father’s and then the Apostle’s Creed. (As a note: there is also a Rosary Novena, which is the regular Rosary said nine days in a row.)
And, while I guess you can just randomly pray for your dead friend’s soul, it is really discouraged. You want to do the formal gig because you want them out of Purgatory ASAP and your random prayers are not as reliable as the formal Catholic prayers.
Also hardly seems worth mentioning is that we were also taught that no one can get into Heaven until the Second Coming of Jesus when he will allow all the righteous, living and dead, access to heaven. Now, how can that be? Clearly, there is some fuzziness about the relationship between Purgatory and the second coming of Christ. If a soul has to be in Purgatory to burn off their sins AND no one can get access to heaven until Christ comes for the second time, WHY on EARTH are we praying to shorten the time souls need to spend in Purgatory? Who identifies the GPS coordinates so those souls know where to hang out once they are out of Purgatory but before Christ comes again? Perhaps, just speculating here, this confusion is the very reason the Catholics did away with Purgatory. Perhaps someone pointed out the inconsistencies in their theories so they said the Papal equivalent of “Whoops! Strike that from the record!” which would then provide clearer guidance. Or perhaps those souls now hang out in Limbo.
OMG!!! Do not even get me started on Limbo! Like I said, it’s hardly worth mentioning.