www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology The Virgin Mary's Walk Through the Torments

Dear John,

Well, I am a Scottish history enthusiast and love Nigel Tranter's novels.

I corresponded with him just before his death and for his 90th birthday, I had my planner-wife name a street for him in a new suburban development. (He was amazed that we still have such developments as he had written several books about the great houses of Scotland.) His book on King Kenneth McAlpine is excellent and, as you know, it was in his time that Scotland adopted the St Andrew's Cross as its emblem.

I've also developed two pieces of heritage legislation which are now law in Ontario - Tartan Day, April 6th, and the Ontario District Tartan.

I've also given several public lectures on Celtic Church history as this Church fascinates me.

Again, what I'm outlining is not MY position, but that of the Eastern Church with respect to eschatology.

The Eastern Church does have its own legitimate traditions with respect to this topic, as it does with every other spiritual topic. And so does the Western Church, but I think His Holiness the Pope has shown a "via media" no Anglican pun intended, that unites the Western notion of purgatory with Eastern perspectives. And I'm all for that.

Until the Second Coming of Christ, the Eastern Church does not believe that most of the Saints are in Heaven (which is a place, of course). The "forecourt" of Heaven is where the saints see Christ etc. There is no suffering there, but only bliss.

That the East believes in prayer for the dead is absolute - some have argued how can it since it doesn't believe in Purgatory.

And yet, if we consider Purgatory to be a state, an experience of cleansing, then there is no real problem, is there?

Actually, the Byzantine Church has identical times for prayer for the dead that the Celtic Church had - twelve in number.

The Celtic Church saints were influenced by Coptic spirituality - there is mention made of seven Coptic saints in Ireland. St Patrick prayed the Psalms as the Coptic monks would and St Maelruain divided them up into 12 groups that he said at the beginning of each day hour - and again each night hour, the ancient Coptic practice that the Byzantine Church still has in one section of its Psalter.

One would pray the Psalms incessantly for the dead, once over the body when it is laid out, then four more times throughout the night before the funeral.

Celtic monks often prayed certain numbers of Psalters for different states (again, no pun intended) of people and a bishop who died was to have the Psalms prayed for him 600 times!

We're agreed that the dead are to be prayed for and that this prayer brings them closer to God.

St Peter Mohyla of Kyiv in his Catechism (to throw a monkey wrench into the works, he actually DID believe in the Western Purgatory - for which he was censured by the Orthodox Patriarchs, but he didn't care . . .) said that even if we saw someone commit a serious sin before their death, we are bound to pray to God to ask Him not to punish him according to his sin etc.

Every Saturday in the Byzantine Church is dedicated to Our Lady, the Saints and to prayer for the reposed.

During the meal served following the funeral, the long Psalm 119 is to be read beforehand, and every day for forty days, along with the rest of the Psalter, as much as people can.

What are some traditions regarding prayer for the dead in the Latin Church these days?

Alex

Dear Brethren,

Regarding the efficaciousness of prayer for the dead:

God hears our prayers, made thousand years ago or made a thousand years from now, outside of time and space. They are his circumscibable creations, as we ourselves are. He hears all the prayers "at once" outside of time and space before the beginning of all created things.

Therefore, many eastern theologians don't accept any "state" between death and "resurrection" other than a state of rememberance. God remembers the dead that "were," although they no longer "are."

"....Rachel crying for her children for they were not...."

Now this approach is very "Antiochian school." It stays within scripture to discern these things. I raise it here and ask you to entertain that the purgation of a soul/life need occur while one is living. If one accepts the action of the Holy Spirit in one's life, then it stings/burns because it is a healing corrective to our sins. But it will cleanse us and prepare us to endure the glories that are of the next world.

Those who blaspheme/deny the action of the Holy Spirit in their lives are those who cannot be forgiven exactly because they are those who cannot admit his merciful, forgiving interaction in their lives. They reject the need for God's mercy and forgiveness.

The parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus clearly seems to support this view.

So maybe we need to think of purgation as here and now?

With love in Christ.

I'll have to read Tranter, thanks for the tip.

You are Canadian! My grandfather was born in Glencoe, Ontario in 1875 and then came to Detroit for medical school. In fact, my maternal grandfather was also born Canadian. My sister is married to an Irishman who is a landed immigrant and lives in Peterborough, so her kids are also Canadian.

I knew that the Celtic Church had ties to the Coptic, not surprising since it was so monastically-based. I knew also that Rome and Alexandria seem to have had some special relationship: Athanasius' fleeing to Rome under persecution and Celestine's deputing Cyril to act for Rome in the Nestorian crisis are what come immediately to my mind. I didn't know about the seven Coptic saints. But we do celebrate the feasts of some Egyptian saints in the Roman calendar.

I do have a problem with your statement of what you say is the "Eastern" position, since I don't see how it can be reconciled with defined Catholic doctrine, as you can no doubt see. I know that this is the opinion of the Eastern Orthodox, but do Eastern Catholics say that this is also the official position of all the Eastern Catholic churches? If so, how can they be in communion with Rome, given the dogmatic teaching of Benedict XII in 1336 that the Catholic Catechism quotes? Yet your answer to me implies that a member of the Eastern churches can indeed hold the belief in purgatory if he wants.

Perhaps I misinterpreted also your "forecourt of heaven" image, although I will note that pain and joy are not mutually exclusive: one thinks of a mother giving birth, or St. Ignatius being ground like meal in the lions' teeth, or maybe the spin I gave the other day to story of the Prodigal Son's final approach to his Father. But who is in heaven itself, then, if the saints see Christ already in the forecourt? Do they ever get inside the mansion?

Indeed, purgatory is a state or condition, not a place, and I see no reason why any Latin would fight about this statement of yours, even before the Pope's recent opinion on the subject, since there are no bodies there and there never will be any. The Pope's statement was nothing new, as I had never heard or thought that purgatory was a place instead of a state, or that the "fire" spoken of could be a real physical fire. What kind of fire can burn a spiritual substance, after all?

You ask about our Latin remembrance of the dead. You should really ask someone more qualified than I, but I do remember that it is part of the grace at meals "And may the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace", and this originally from the monastic office. We remember the dead on the anniversary of their death, at every mass, at the average layman's thanksgiving after communion, upon retiring at night, when we have a mass said especially for them. Religious orders and congregations and dioceses, I think, have a necrology that lists all the dead by day and year of death, and these are remembered in daily masses by that congregation. My parish during the month of November has a great book in which people write the names of their dead, which are then remembered especially by masses said that month. Our parish also has a cemetery which has a bronze plaque announcing the possibility of and the conditions for gaining a plenary indulgence for visiting the cemetery and praying for the dead. We often have mass or Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament there in the Grotto in front of the graves, and many in the parish remember the dead while praying either the rosary or the chaplet of Divine Mercy or the stations of the Cross in the cemetery. It is commonplace to give an offering to one of the several priests resident in my parish for a mass to be said for a deceased person. Most of the priests and all the nuns are Canons or Sisters of the Holy Cross, religious congregations dedicated to what they call the "Opus Sanctorum Angelorum", the "Work of the Holy Angels". This work dovetails very nicely with remembrance of the dead.

November 1, All Saints Day, a holyday of obligation,is preceded by All Souls Day("Halloween"), and with increasing reaction to interest in the occult or mischif-making (in Detroit they have what they want to call "Devil' Night", the day before Halloween, when they try to torch buildings, etc.) we see more interest in celebrating the religious aspects of All Souls' Day than there used to be. I knew the famous catechist/theologian Fr.John Hardon very well and used to do work for him. Throughout his life Fr. Hardon always abstained from meat on Saturdays in honor of Our Lady, and sought to get others to do so. Now, this could have a Byzantine connection, since although he was a priest of the Roman rite Fr. Hardon was of Eastern Slovak origin, and I think that at his mother might have been a Byzantine Catholic: he said once that his first prayerbook was in "Russian", (not Slovak, apparently) which I took to mean it was in Cyrillic characters. Oh, yes, we always have the rosary and sometimes Scripture services at the funeral home, and a mass on the day of burial with a graveside service. There's probably more. Maybe someone else can remember what I've forgotten.

I hope all this is of interest or use to you or someone.

Regards,

John McAlpine

Hello Alex:

I'll have to read Tranter, thanks for the tip.

You are Canadian! My grandfather was born in Glencoe, Ontario in 1875 and then came to Detroit for medical school. In fact, my maternal grandfather was also born Canadian. My sister is married to an Irishman who is a landed immigrant and lives in Peterborough, so her kids are also Canadian.

I knew that the Celtic Church had ties to the Coptic, not surprising since it was so monastically-based. I knew also that Rome and Alexandria seem to have had some special relationship: Athanasius' fleeing to Rome under persecution and Celestine's deputing Cyril to act for Rome in the Nestorian crisis are what come immediately to my mind. I didn't know about the seven Coptic saints. But we do celebrate the feasts of some Egyptian saints in the Roman calendar.

I do have a problem with your statement of what you say is the "Eastern" position, since I don't see how it can be reconciled with defined Catholic doctrine, as you can no doubt see. I know that this is the opinion of the Eastern Orthodox, but do Eastern Catholics say that this is also the official position of all the Eastern Catholic churches? If so, how can they be in communion with Rome, given the dogmatic teaching of Benedict XII in 1336 that the Catholic Catechism quotes? Yet your answer to me implies that a member of the Eastern churches can indeed hold the belief in purgatory if he wants.

Perhaps I misinterpreted also your "forecourt of heaven" image, although I will note that pain and joy are not mutually exclusive: one thinks of a mother giving birth, or St. Ignatius being ground like meal in the lions' teeth, or maybe the spin I gave the other day to story of the Prodigal Son's final approach to his Father. But who is in heaven itself, then, if the saints see Christ already in the forecourt? Do they ever get inside the mansion?

Indeed, purgatory is a state or condition, not a place, and I see no reason why any Latin would fight about this statement of yours, even before the Pope's recent opinion on the subject, since there are no bodies there and there never will be any. The Pope's statement was nothing new, as I had never heard or thought that purgatory was a place instead of a state, or that the "fire" spoken of could be a real physical fire. What kind of fire can burn a spiritual substance, after all?

You ask about our Latin remembrance of the dead. You should really ask someone more qualified than I, but I do remember that it is part of the grace at meals "And may the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace", and this originally from the monastic office. We remember the dead on the anniversary of their death, at every mass, at the average layman's thanksgiving after communion, upon retiring at night, when we have a mass said especially for them. Religious orders and congregations and dioceses, I think, have a necrology that lists all the dead by day and year of death, and these are remembered in daily masses by that congregation. My parish during the month of November has a great book in which people write the names of their dead, which are then remembered especially by masses said that month. Our parish also has a cemetery which has a bronze plaque announcing the possibility of and the conditions for gaining a plenary indulgence for visiting the cemetery and praying for the dead. We often have mass or Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament there in the Grotto in front of the graves, and many in the parish remember the dead while praying either the rosary or the chaplet of Divine Mercy or the stations of the Cross in the cemetery. It is commonplace to give an offering to one of the several priests resident in my parish for a mass to be said for a deceased person. Most of the priests and all the nuns are Canons or Sisters of the Holy Cross, religious congregations dedicated to what they call the "Opus Sanctorum Angelorum", the "Work of the Holy Angels". This work dovetails very nicely with remembrance of the dead.

November 1, All Saints Day, a holyday of obligation,is preceded by All Souls Day("Halloween"), and with increasing reaction to interest in the occult or mischif-making (in Detroit they have what they want to call "Devil' Night", the day before Halloween, when they try to torch buildings, etc.) we see more interest in celebrating the religious aspects of All Souls' Day than there used to be. I knew the famous catechist/theologian Fr.John Hardon very well and used to do work for him. Throughout his life Fr. Hardon always abstained from meat on Saturdays in honor of Our Lady, and sought to get others to do so. Now, this could have a Byzantine connection, since although he was a priest of the Roman rite Fr. Hardon was of Eastern Slovak origin, and I think that at his mother might have been a Byzantine Catholic: he said once that his first prayerbook was in "Russian", (not Slovak, apparently) which I took to mean it was in Cyrillic characters. Oh, yes, we always have the rosary and sometimes Scripture services at the funeral home, and a mass on the day of burial with a graveside service. There's probably more. Maybe someone else can remember what I've forgotten.

I hope all this is of interest or use to you or someone.

Regards,

John McAlpine

John McAlpline said:

"I do have a problem with your statement of what you say is the "Eastern" position, since I don't see how it can be reconciled with defined Catholic doctrine, as you can no doubt see. I know that this is the opinion of the Eastern Orthodox, but do Eastern Catholics say that this is also the official position of all the Eastern Catholic churches? If so, how can they be in communion with Rome, given the dogmatic teaching of Benedict XII in 1336 that the Catholic Catechism quotes? Yet your answer to me implies that a member of the Eastern churches can indeed hold the belief in purgatory if he wants."

Dear John,

To try to answer your repeated question on this thread and a similar one regarding the papacy on another thread, in a very siplistic way (that's all I'm capable of) , I think it is correct to say the following:

The Eastern Catholic Churches, recognizing their call to be "Orthodox in Communion with Rome" (per the request of Rome herself) no longer look to the Pope of Old Rome to define every detail of their Churches' faith. Rather they look to their own authentic Traditions of their respective Eastern Churches to define this faith.

I know this opens a can of worms, to a believing Roman Catholic, like yourself. I know you'll probably find this totally unnacceptable. But I think it (while not being a perfect definition) might at least represent the goal for which we strive (no matter how unnacceptable you may find it). It at least, might help you understand why the quotes you are pulling out of the Latin Churches' documents (which you will call documents of the "Catholic Church") have not a great meaning for us striving to remain faithful to our unique Eastern perspectives and theological traditions.

While we respect the Latin Church's Tradition, we do not follow it. We must follow our own, which was handed down by our own Eastern Fathers.

If any of the Eastern Catholics on this forum, especially the Administrators, think what I say is false, please correct me.

In Christ's Light,

Wm. Der-Ghazarian Wolfe

p.s. To understand this above mentioned Eastern Catholic perspective you may want to get your hands on some Eastern Catholic literature. "Educational Services" of the Melkite Church are a handy publishing company. Elias Zoghby, among others, is a must read in the study of this topic. I have a link to it on my Eastern Christian Links Page under "Melkite Greek Catholic Church:

http://www.geocities.com/wmwolfe_48044/EC_Links.html

Dear John,

I think we are quibbling about terms rather than what we believe here.

The Holy Father has said that purgatory is a state, not a place, and so there should be no problem between Eastern theology and Western theology.

Don't take this the wrong way, but I think you are too quick to impute the wrong motive to the Eastern Churches when you find they have a different theological approach than the Western Church.

If anything, His Holiness has said that we should all celebrate the fact that we have our own Particular patrimonies, theological schools and the like.

We don't use "Purgatory" but that doesn't mean that we don't pray for the dead to be "loosed from their sins." Your point on how can a spirt be "burned" is precisely what the Greeks at Florence told the Latins when they spoke of "purgatorial fire."

For us, as well, "Purgatory" sounds a bit legalistic, a way station where one "pays off" the remaining spiritual debts etc. That is why the East doesn't accept indulgences. Before you get upset here as well, please remember that the Eastern saints lived lives of deep penance and prayer - until their dying breath. Again, it all comes down to the same thing, we take different paths - that is all.

Let's talk about the Scots now . . .

Yes, the Scottish contribution to life in Canada and Ontario is very great - as it is in the U.S.

And I'm proud to have been able to establish a day in honour of our Scottish ancestry.

Nigel Tranter wrote a number of novels that provide great insights into the life of the Scottish Columban Celtic Church.

I'd recommend his DRUID SACRIFICE which is the story of St Kentigern Mungo and his mother, St Thanea. His COLUMBA is a masterpiece and relates the story of this great Celtic missionary while showing many of the ancient Celtic Christian ways. Of course, his trilogy, ROBERT THE BRUCE is one thousand pages of sheer historical pleasure and does make mention of the Celtic Church even in the hero-king's day. MARGARET THE QUEEN talks about the woman who brought the dominance of the Roman Church to Scotland and DAVID THE PRINCE is about her pious son. Even MACBETH THE KING has a lot of Celtic tradition in it as does his THE WALLACE.

God bless,

Alex

Is there a dichotomy between "punishment" and "medicine"?

I suppose to our modern minds there is. It was not so long ago, however, that parents and teachers routinely used physical punishment, not for vengenance or justice, but as a means to instill right behavior. It was, apart from cases of abuse, medicinal, not legal. Now, of course, we are far more sophisticated (but arguably less effective). We have talking therapy and time-outs to help out children grow in right behavior; physical punishment now seems inherently abusive and incompatible with true love. It therefore becomes increasingly difficult for us to understand "punishment" from a loving God, and increasingly easy to see it as incompatibile with concepts purification and theosis.

In earlier times, I doubt that people had any trouble in understanding punishment as being medicinal and purifying. I suppose, however, that this metaphor, this teaching vehicle may have outlived its usefulness to our sophisticated modern minds.

Dear djs,

You are probably right!

Alex