Letters to Arthur: Indulgences

This might be helpful for some in understanding indulgences: (Pat came up with the title)

Alright guys, just jotting down my thoughts on this, it's not very organized, sorry about that :P But it's long, sorry about that too!! But I hope it helps to clear some stuff up!

To understand indulgences, we have to understand the Sacrament that it is tied to: Reconciliation also known as the Sacrament of Penance. To understand that Sacrament, we have to understand Sacraments in general (what they are, what they do, etc.) and sin.

I’ll cover briefly sin, Sacraments in general, then the Sacrament of Penance and then we’ll dive into indulgences.

Sin we know is anything that is a turning away from God, in our thoughts, words, and actions. To have any sin keeps us away from God because He is perfect. From both the Bible as well as our own experiences, we know that sin not only keeps us away from God, but also from each other (other people, especially the ones we love the most). We see this in the original Fall between Adam and Eve, and then with Cain, Lot and his wife, etc which is a unnatural (as God meant us to be) way of relating to other creatures. So there is a twofold effect of sin: First, especially grave sin keeps us away from God so much so that we may even be denied eternal life. Second, sin also gives us unhealthy attachments to creatures (from inanimate objects to other human beings, to even angels rather, usually demons). I like to think of it like if you do something wrong, you are: 1. guilty, and 2: suffer the consequences. Scott Hahn has the example of if you drove your car into someone’s home. God’s forgiveness is so great, He doesn’t just forgive you, He asks you to be in His family and adopt you. My addition to that is, okay you’re now an heir and a part of the family that’s living in the house, but the house has a huge hole where your car ran into that still needs to be fixed. That’s the consequence.

The other thing to keep in mind about sin is that since God is all good and perfect, every sin offends not only the person or persons we sin against, but we sin against God as well. (another way to think about the double effect of sin).

Sacraments briefly are just outward signs of inward grace that effect (actually make happen) what they symbolize. The Sacrament of Penance of Reconciliation then is God forgiving a person. The priest then stands in the person of Christ as it’s Christ that forgives the penitent through the priest. (This does NOT mean this is the ONLY way God forgives sins, but it’s the normal way Jesus instituted because God is not limited by the methods He chose to use to interact with us, but we have to keep in mind He CHOSE to do it that way). So when the Christ forgives us through the priest, our guilt is taken away. We are no longer guilty of the sins we committed, because of Christ’s sacrifice on Calvary. However, we live in time and space and we have consequences. The consequences of sin is not JUST the act of the sin (like the hole in the house you ran your car into), but also that sins effect on ourselves! We know from experience that the more we sin, the easier it is to sin next time. Which leads inevitably to the “hardness of hearts” that Jesus seems to really dislike. That’s one way of looking at what’s termed “temporal punishment” of sin, that not only do we ourselves have to deal with, but those around us and especially those we love and love us. Versus “eternal punishment” which is from the guilt of the sin itself. That’s why when we receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation the priest declares that we are forgiven and then gives us a “penance.” An act to remit the temporal effects of the sin. For example, if you stole 10 bucks from your mom, your penance could be to give it back. For most sins, these sorts of actions are impractical, many times impossible (like you stole 10 bucks, but you spent it on candy which you ate). So prayers or other devout acts are prescribed so that we are less attached in the unhealthy way that the sin causes to us by drawing to God and asking for His help. The act of trying to repair our relationships with those we’ve wronged is called “satisfaction” which is usually also included in the penances.

I hope we won’t have to go over the Biblical references about the above info. There is also the aspect of the salvific role of the Church in our lives. Since we are “sensual” people, we learn, interact, etc. in and through our senses. (This is one of the reasons for Sacraments) It makes sense then that Christ chose to proclaim the Good News to people and bring people to eternal life through the Church, although we know it’s not the ONLY way God can do those things.

Now, indulgences. Indulgences are for those sins where the temporal punishment was not complete. They can be for ourselves as well as for those who’ve died. Since we know that God is perfect and to be in His presence eternally means we must be perfect, without any sin and without any “stains” of sins (attachments to any sin). So that means when we die, there must be a purgatory where these attachments to sin that weren’t purified in our lives must be purified. In our lives, even when we receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation we forget some lesser sins but the forgiveness is for ALL our sins we’ve committed so far. So there may be some temporal punishments that weren’t worked on in our life that would need to be purified of after we die.

So we see how indulgences benefit us in a very real temporal (lessens the “time” in purgatory) and spiritual way (conforms our lives and ourselves to be more like Christ). A good reference would be Eph 17-24, where we have real actions prescribed by Christ’s Church to “put away” the old and “put on the new self.” Formally speaking though, there is no such thing as time in purgatory because purgatory is after our lives on earth and so is in the eternal, which cannot be measured in time because it is what some philosophers and theologians call “aeviternal” or infinite in one direction. (Whereas eternal is infinite in both directions so only God is eternal, no beginning and no end). But we speak of purgatory in time because we live in time for now and it’s hard to imagine otherwise.

But there’s the issue of indulgences benefiting those that have already departed. This goes into the whole “treasury” of the merits of Christ. But from what Paul said, Col. 1:24, we can “fill up” our merits to Christ’s, adding up the merits. And so we can gain indulgences for those who’ve past and are in purgatory.

The bad wrap indulgences have was the "sale" of them in the old days. This was understandable because if your penance was to donate some money, it could easily become something like "donating extra money this month can be counted as an indulgence." and so this can be interpreted as "buying your way out of purgatory." Was this abused? of course! the priests and even bishops are human, especially when money is needed for good purposes or sometimes even not so good purposes (personal greed of a priest of bishop). And with publicity like this NY Times article, we can see that not only is the general public not aware of what an indulgence is, but so is the average Catholic! (which is really sad). But it indeed is a grave sin to actually “sell” an indulgence or any other holy article (blessed things, or Sacraments and sacramentals) for profit, which is considered Simony after Simon the magician from the Gospels. But the abuse of these things, including indulgences does not make the teaching invalid.

Okay, this is long enough and I’m sure reading all this is some form of “purgatory” :P Anyway, these are just my thoughts based off the Compendium (PAT, you have a copy of this!! Start reading it!! Hahaha) and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Here are the quotes and references for more reading if you’re interested below. I’ll also give you the link for the indulgence I’m actually planning to obtain for my grandma who just past away a few days before this Easter. I would also recommend, (I should have put this at the top before you read this) stuff from Scott Hahn, who’s WAY more Biblical than I.

Links below:

• Compendium 312: Indulgences are the remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven. The faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains the indulgence under prescribed conditions for either himself of the departed. Indulgences are granted through the ministry of the Church for which, as the dispenser of grace of redemption, distributes the treasury of the merits of Christ and the Saints.

• Ref: CCC1471-1479, CCC 1498, section on Sacrament of Penance right above that section

• Scott Hahn phone interview about Indulgences

• If you REALLY want to get Biblical with Scott Hahn, but it’s pricey :P

• Declaration of a special indulgence in honor of St. Paul on what would be his 2000^th birthday!!