Listecki: these days people want to believe everyone is in heaven

From Word to the Father

Archbishop Listecki chose to write about the Doctrine of Purgatory in his weekly column: Love One Another.  Here is the text:

This is the feast of All Souls.

Growing up, I prayed and learned about family members (e.g., grandmother, grandfather, aunts, uncles and cousins) who had died years before I was born. I was told stories about them, and often my mother and I would pray for them on their birthdays. I believe it was the prayer which kept them alive in my memory. I knew that I could assist them with my prayers, and I was confident that they would assist me with theirs.

Although we Catholics have held on to many traditions throughout the years, there is one Catholic teaching which has somehow fallen off our radar – purgatory. It is a place of purgation (i.e., purification). The souls in purgatory are atoning for temporal punishment due to sins. We can assist them through our prayers and good works, and lessen the suffering they must endure for their purification. Perhaps the concept of purgatory is lost because these days people want to believe everyone is in heaven. However, only God (or his Church through canonization) may truly judge if a person is worthy of heaven.

Many of the reflections offered by family or friends at a funeral service usually canonize the individual.  [Amen!] I readily understand why this is so. It is often the affection or appreciation felt for the person, or a tribute that one desires to give. However, we need to remember that when someone dies, he or she was a real person who lived in a real world, and as a Catholic Church, we have declared that only Jesus and His Blessed Mother were born without original sin. Therefore, there is a need to pray for those love ones who have died. It is spiritually healthy and reminds us of the necessity to live fully the Christian life.

When I was teaching in the seminary, I would take the opportunity, especially after a funeral, to address the seminarians. I would emphasize that if I were to die and someone at my funeral got up to give a reflection that bordered on my canonization (however unlikely that should be), I wished for the seminarians to stand up and declare that Father Listecki had said, “I am a sinner and in need of your prayers.” I believe we can offer our deceased loved ones no greater tribute than prayer.

The greatest prayer of the Church is the Mass and, the Church in her wisdom, establishes All Souls Day as a means for praying for those souls in purgatory. When someone dies, we quickly order flowers, but the flowers die in a few days. However, when a Mass is offered, it is an act which carries merit to the loved one who has passed from this world.

Bishop Fulton Sheen stated he believes (never one to be presumptuous) that if he makes it to heaven, he will be greeted with two surprises. First, he will be amazed at the individuals who are in heaven that he never thought would be there and, second, he will be surprised at the absence of individuals he thought would be there. I will occasionally add a prayer for the most neglected soul in purgatory, some soul in need of assistance. It’s comforting for me to think that I can assist a brother or a sister beyond this world. As St. Paul states, “So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” My brothers and sisters, “LOVE ONE ANOTHER.”

Sincerely yours in Christ,

Most Reverend Jerome E. Listecki
Archbishop of Milwaukee