Christian Cyclopedia

About the Cyclopedia





Purgatory.

Catechismus Romanus, I, vi, 3: “Besides [hell] there is a purging fire, by which the souls of the pious, tormented for a set time, are purified, so that they might enter the eternal fatherland, into which nothing defiled enters.” Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, Sess. XXV, Decree Concerning Purgatory: “There is a purgatory, and … the souls there detained are aided by the suffrages of the faithful and chiefly by the acceptable sacrifice of the altar… The more difficult and subtle questions … are to be excluded from popular instructions to uneducated people. Likewise, things that are uncertain or have the appearance of falsehood they shall not permit to be made known publicly and discussed.” RCm refers to 2 Mac 12:43–45.

C. N. Callinicos, The Greek Orthodox Catechism (New York, 1960), p. 48: “Scripture … has never expressed anything whatever concerning a third state, such as a temporary Purgatory.”

The idea of purgatory entered the Ch. of Eng. through the Oxford* Movement (see also England, C 7) in the form of an intermediate* state but without developing into a gen. accepted teaching. Common opinion makes it less a process of purification than of development and growth, ending only at the Last Judgment.

Luths. regard purgatory as unscriptural, insulting to Christ, indefensible, mercenary. WA 7, 452; 30 III, 309; 44, 812; WA-T 3, 539.

See also Florence, Council of, 2; Indulgences.


Edited by: Erwin L. Lueker, Luther Poellot, Paul Jackson
©Concordia Publishing House, 2000, All rights Reserved. Reproduced with Permission

Internet Version Produced by
The Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod


Original Editions ©Copyright 1954, 1975, 2000
Concordia Publishing House
All rights reserved.

Content Reproduced with Permission

Stay Connected! Join the LCMS Network:

Contact Us Online
800-248-1930
(Staff Switchboard)
888-843-5267
(Church Info Center)
1333 S Kirkwood Rd
Saint Louis, MO 63122-7226 | Directions

 

Featured Publication

The Lutheran Witness

LCMS Communications

Interpreting the contemporary world from a Lutheran Christian perspective.
Visit TLW Online