is there any chance that purgatory is not completely horrible?

[Mitchy1nge]

I imagine it is exactly like hell, all fiery torment etc but temporal, with possibility of release at some point, instead of eternal. Please can I be wrong about this?

[AngiBolen]

Well, if you want to be prepared, never sin and you'll get straight to heaven.

They say souls have to be purified before they go to heaven (I get that, you wouldn't want dirty souls in nice clean heaven) and catholic called this purgatory..which was then embellished into something quite dramatic. As a child I was told if you committed suicide you would go to purgatory forever. I imagined people just floated around doing nothing forever, not happy or sad. That now seems like nonsense.

[Knowsabitabouteducation]

I think it was Limbo that the RCC randomly abolished. Maybe they will do the same for publicly celibate clergy.

[BoulevardOfBrokenSleep]

Sorry, my mistake, Wikipedia-ing shows I did indeed confuse it with limbo.

It's a bit of a weird concept though, isn't it? I mean, if you weren't washed clean by the blood of Christ and all that, while you were alive, what's the point of some sort of afterlife Holloway where you work off your remaining sins?

I think in the olden days, you used to be encouraged to leave money in your will to fund masses and prayers to speed your way through purgatory.
Now, I'm not saying that system is open to corruption or anything, but...

[Mitchy1nge]

but it's not expensive to have a mass said, you don't have to donate if you can't or don't want to?

[EllieArroway]

well why pray for the dead then, if there is no purgatory?

Why would you bother praying at all? If you believe in God, then who do you think invented "purgatory" and chooses to put people there? What difference are the prayers of a few feeble humans supposed to make?

More to the point, if you genuinely believe in purgatory, why would you worship the immoral monster that came up with such a vile idea?

All of this rubbish was invented by superstitious medieval people who had no understanding of reality. We have a better one now, so there's no justification in believing such nonsense.

It's not true, so stop worrying. Really.

[Annunziata]

Ciao cara.

You only get to purgatory if you are going to heaven anyway, so it is not Hell.

[Mitchy1nge]

ok

you sound so much like my friend! I love her logic, I wish I wasn't so superstitious

[Mitchy1nge]

Ciao! Come stai?

easy for you to say, you are Good

[Annunziata]

Pfff, definitely not.

Assai megghiu addivintirai si a la morti pinsirai.

[garlicbrunch]

At my CofE primary school, 1960s, purgatory was a yawning, empty blah where you had to float around regretting all the bad things you'd done. It wasn't fire & pain but - here's the stinger - there'd be no sense of time (or any other senses) so it would feel like you were there for eternity. Once you'd got sorry enough for your errors, you'd be let into heaven. It was remarkably like a cosmic naughty corner

Assai megghiu addivintirai si a la morti pinsirai. As an atheist who will simply cease to exist at the end of my life, I agree with that! One of the better tools for deciding what to do with one's life is to imagine what you'll think about it on your last day - and what people will say at your funeral. If they're going to say "She kept a very clean house" and you're going to think "I wish I'd been a sculptor", it's a good sign you need to do less housework and more art classes

[Mitchy1nge]

I think sono d'accordo con tu too ma addivintirai - come addivengo?

[Mitchy1nge]

anyway even i am good ogni morte di papa

[Mitchy1nge]

What does it mean then, it is better (to reach?) if we think of death?

[Mitchy1nge]

our reach improves if we think of death?

[Mitchy1nge]

I will never know will I :(

Assai like essere? Megghui - meglio, addivintirai - ? and the rest, if one thinks of death (pinsirai - pensare?)

[garlicbrunch]

"You'll be a better person if you think about death."
Sicilian.

[Mitchy1nge]

thanks :)

do you by any chance know what addivintirai means?

[garlicbrunch]

As I understand it, it's literally "I will arrive at being better if I think about death". I'm no expert, though.

Sicilians are very good at thinking about death. And wine!

[Mitchy1nge]

oooooh diventare

I get it

[Mitchy1nge]

to become

one becomes better if one thinks of death

[garlicbrunch]

I had to look it up then! Yes, grow or become! And I should have used the second person :)

[Mitchy1nge]

where do you look it up? I'd love a Sicilian dictionary, but thought these things are not really written anywhere

[garlicbrunch]

Professor Google knows everything
You might like some of the links from here.

[Pan]

I am pretty sure that the notion of purgatory is based on how you live your life now. It isn't a 'future event'. So if you are compromising yourself all of the time, it will feel like a 'purgatory', but the faith indicates you have motivation to not do that to yourself and others. It isn't rocket science or 'clever' at all.