Dear Father,
How long does a person stay in purgatory? I’m asking because a friend who was baptized Catholic died recently but wasn’t going to church. Will purgatory be longer for him? Do non-Catholics go to purgatory or do they go straight to heaven since they don’t believe in purgatory?
-Anne
Dear Anne,
Purgatory, I imagine, probably will seem like forever, even if it is temporary.
I hate lines. Sometimes I think of purgatory as being in backed up traffic on a crowded freeway for dozens of miles with no one moving an inch on a hot, humid day, without air conditioning in the car with no nearby exits whatsoever, and I need a restroom badly. One minute can feel like an eternity.
Waiting to see someone we love very much may seem endless. Waiting to see God will be bittersweet because we know we will see Him for whom our heart longs, but waiting while we suffer the effects of our sins will be very painful.
There is no time in purgatory as we know time. Purgatory is a state of purification rather than a place, as Pope Benedict pointed out in his encyclical Spe Salvi.
It’s difficult to think of ourselves in a state of being without also thinking of being somewhere in that state. That’s because we are both spiritual and physical. We have a soul and a body. At the moment of death, we are bereft of our body. During our entire life, we have only known ourselves as being somewhere. That’s why it is nearly impossible for us to imagine ourselves as not being in a place.
Yet, that is exactly what happens when we die. We are incomplete at death. We are now only our souls. After our death, we await the resurrection of our bodies so that we may enjoy eternity with our glorified bodies and souls.
The point here is that purgatory cannot be a physical place. We use the concept of being in a place because it’s easier to imagine.
In addition to purification, Pope Benedict spoke about healing in order to “mature the soul for communion with God.” This is the most important aspect of purgatory. We are being prepared for the intimacy with God that we, in various ways, avoided in our life on earth.
You can’t really quantify maturation, especially maturation that allows for communion with God. Some people, well past retirement age, act like adolescents. They seem impervious to growing up. On the other hand, there are very young people who are extremely mature in their actions and outlook on life.
At the moment of death, as Pope Benedict pointed out, our life-choice becomes definitive. We have no more choices to make. That means that the character we have developed, what we have made of our life, is set. “There can be people,” the pope said, “who have totally destroyed their desire for truth and readiness to love, people for whom everything has become a lie, people who have lived for hatred and have suppressed all love within themselves.”
One excellent measure of maturity is the ability to live for others rather than for only oneself. Christian maturity goes a step further: one lives more for Jesus and others than for oneself. This gives an insight into the meaning of Christ’s words: “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 16:25).
Concerning your friend who died: The “time” we spend in purgatory depends on the way we lived our lives. You said your friend didn’t go to church. Because we don’t know why your friend didn’t go to church, we have to leave the question of the depth of purgation needed in God’s hands. Only He knows the depths of our heart and only He can judge us aright. Only He can provide what is necessary for our entrance into His brilliant and shining glory.
And that goes for every single soul that God has created, Catholic or not.
Only those go straight into the presence of God who have loved Him completely in their lives on earth. That includes people who have committed horrific crimes but lived a life of repentance and died a holy death. Think of the Good Thief crucified next to Jesus.
I’ll never forget the vivid image that Sister Arthur (a Felician Sister, in her dark brown habit) gave us when I was preparing for my First Holy Communion. She said that purgatory was like going through a car wash with hard bristles scrubbing the stains off our souls. To this day, I wonder how many miles of car-wash bristles my soul will need when I die.
I hope that I don’t have to wait for very long when it’s my time to see God face to face. Let’s pray for each other that we can be purged of our earthly attachments now and be ready for heaven we die.
