January 30, 2025 • 30 mins
Indulgences—an ancient Catholic practice—have long been misunderstood and, at times, misrepresented. Some call them a spiritual treasure; others, a relic of the past. But what lies at the heart of this mystery?
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(00:00):
Even among Catholics, there is a lot of confusionabout indulgences. For some, it is a Catholic
scam. For others, it's like someone trying tosell you real estate in heaven. And for others,
it's just something that doesn't have anythingto do because we do not need any mercy. So
today in this program, we're going to find outwhat are indulgences for, how they stand in
(00:23):
the Bible from the Bible perspective, and alsowhat the Catholic doctrine has to tell us.
Welcome to Salve Maria, the podcast of the Heraldsof the Gospel.
Maria, Father. Hallelujah. Hallelujah, BrotherJustin. Salve Maria. Fr. Arthur, what exactly,
(00:45):
let's start with that for our audience, whatexactly indulgences are? Okay, so indulgence
comes from Latin. It's a Latin word that meanskindness, tender. It means something that is
given out of the kindness of the Church forthe good of the soul.
(01:10):
and we are guilty of an eternal punishment.That guilt, we can only take it away by sacramental
confession. So the confession will give us thepardon of our guilt over the eternal damnation.
(01:31):
But we also have to pay a debt because of thesin, and that is called a temporal debt. So
to pay the debt, the priest in confession givesus a penance. But there are other things also
that we can do, other than the penance of thepriest, to pay our debt for our sins, mortal
(01:54):
or venial. And this is where the indulgencecomes in. It's in paying the debt. It's not
the forgiveness of the sin. The forgivenessof the sin can only be done in sacramental
confession. And this is something very, veryimportant that unfortunately wasn't clear.
as we are going to see in a few minutes, inthe Catholic world in the 16th, 15th century
(02:23):
and originated a great confusion, a terriblething for the church, but the church never
intended to say what Protestants unfortunatelythink. Protestants think one thing, but we
never said that. We don't mean that. So, it'snot just to help us to pay for the debt. of
(02:44):
our sins. The penance that we need to pay forour sins. This penance we can do it on earth,
arms giving, acts of charity, prayers, sacrifices,etc. Or we can do it in our life after death,
(03:06):
meaning purgatory. So we can pay the debt inpurgatory if we haven't paid the debt already.
in our life on earth by our penance and by acceptingthe indulgences that the church gives us out
of her kindness and tenderness. I think it'sreally important when we look at the question
(03:27):
of indulgences. In some of the 18th centuryhighest devotions, there was some really astronomical
amount of days placed on certain prayers oractions. But the idea was, what Jesus mentioned,
(03:48):
was that people would be pulled out of hell.So it was some way in which you could pray
for a relative who was really, really objectivelybad and you could stop them from going to hell
and bring them to heaven. Or you could ringin someone who's already in hell and by praying
this prayer that gives you 70 years and youjust keep praying until you accomplish… miracle
(04:14):
and you quench that element. Or a plenary indulgenceby which supposedly you will be taking somebody
out of hell, which is completely ridiculous.No, but the key is that it is based on the
premise that the person already is in a goodstate of soul. That means that they have gone
to sacramental confession, they have receivedabsolution of their mortal sins. They may have
(04:39):
vigno, right? Their soul may be sick. but theirsoul's not dead. And that changes the whole
scenario. A person in the state of Vinylsson,not immortal, if they were to die at that moment,
they would end up in purgatory. Which meansthey're on, they are saved, they are going
to go to heaven, but they have a period wherethey need purgation, they need to be corrected.
(05:00):
And that is where the role of indulgence isfallen to. But this looks like always an invention
of the Catholic Church. And the tractors saythat, but also Protestants as well. And people
who are not familiar with the Catholic doctrinealso tend to accuse the church of, again, grabbing
money out of selling something that is in heaven.So today- It's in the gospel. Yes, of course.
(05:21):
No, no, totally in the gospel, in the Bibletoo. So today we're going to exactly see the
reasons and the principles briefly, of course,because otherwise people just stay until the
end because we also have three myths about indulgencesthat are so wrong that need to be debunked.
But the first one, for instance, indulgences,right? They are right because- we have a penance
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to pay, on earth, after sin. And also becausewe not only feel guilty when we commit a sin,
right? But also there is something, if we donot clear, there is something for the whole
eternity. So the prophet Isaiah here has something,right? God himself says, I will punish the
(06:02):
world for its evil. So when there is sin, thereis punishment. We cannot deny it. And the wicked
for their iniquity. There is also, you know,every time people commit a sin, there is a
consequence. And I will put an end to the prayerof the arrogant and lay low the insolence of
tyrants. And even more, Father, Ecclesiastessays, for God will bring every deed into judgment,
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including every secret thing, whether good orevil. So there are consequences for eternal
life, correct? The need to be clear. Of course.They have to be paid. So have to be forgiven.
And once it is forgiven, you have to pay
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the temporal punishment because of that sin.That can be as long or short or whatever. It's
out of God's justice. So the innuendoes arenot something that is very precise because
it depends on what God decides. He knows whichpenance. deserves each sin and each sin is
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different and depends on who does it, when hedoes it, at what time, what intention. Even
intention can be the same act, but differentintention can be a different sin. So God will
decide, but we can offer the church helps theperson to offer to God something in reparation
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of that sin. Another thing also to rememberis that once we've died, Time is no longer
an issue. So even when these indulgences havea timeframe place on them, it's a figurative
manner because it isn't something which, thereis no such thing as a day in purgatory or in
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heaven. It's eternity. Precisely. So you don'thave that. And that's where some of the detractors
get in. They say, well, what is this business?It's one year or 50 days or whatever. It's
a period, it's very similar to the problem.It's a point of reference. But actually, just
to clarify, there is no point of referencesanymore in the sense of 100 days, 30 days.
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It doesn't exist. And that was the problem,which is that they were trying to give, as
in Genesis, the element that is the seven days.Why? Because we humans work our lives based
on days, time. But eternity doesn't have to.No, of course, doesn't make sense. So, but
it's more for our purpose than anyone else's.Our understanding, our sensitivities. So, out
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of the treasure of the church, which is thetreasure of the church, is the merits of our
Lord Jesus Christ plus the saints. That is atreasure. The church has this treasure, and
who can dispose of this treasure? He's not theowner of the treasure, but he can use it. The
pope, the authority. And this is where someegalitarian philosophy of the 16th century
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comes in, in which they do not want to acceptthat the church can on earth do what the Lord
Jesus Christ was doing on earth, that He's thecontinuation of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
He has the authority that others don't have.But the Pope, yes, because he is the vicar
of our Lord Jesus Christ, and he can disposeof this treasure and give this treasure to
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some people. who ask for mercy, who ask forindulgence, and the Pope gives this indulgence
that they can use in order to pay their debt.For instance, Father, here we have John 20
that says, Jesus said to them again, Peace bewith you, receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive
the sins of any, they are forgiven them. Andif you retain the sins of any, they are retained.
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So the Church has authority to grant these.indulgences. Absolutely, it's beautiful. So
the pope and of course the bishops also, andeventually the pope can give to other members
of the church the power to a certain degreeto give an indulgence. This is a very kind
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of delicate issue, but the... So mainly thepope has this authority to use this of all
the merits of all of Jesus Christ and give themto the people in order to save them for eternity,
to help them to pay the debts that they haveto pay on earth or in Purgatory. And this is
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something very nice because you can get someintelligence that you can get from somebody
who is in Purgatory, somebody that you thinkthat he is in Purgatory. So you can do this
prayer or this act of piety. that you can doand you can offer this to our Lord Jesus Christ
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for the benefit of such and such. Of courseour Lord Jesus Christ will decide ultimately
if he's going to use it for him or not. Becausemaybe this person is not impurgatory. You don't
know. So our Lord Jesus Christ can use it forsomebody else. Father, a very beautiful example
is the famous Book of Maccabees that some ofour in our audience have already heard. Well,
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because we commented another program, but stillit would be very, very nice to quote the two
parts of it. Because the Book of Maccabees isone of the proofs that the Catholic Church
uses to show how our prayers here on earth canalso be applied to people who have died, right?
And unfortunately some people took these booksout of the Bible, no? Yes, the second Book
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of Maccabees, only Catholic Bibles follow it,while the others chopped them. But yeah, if
we go to the second book of Maccabees, chapter12, and then it says, basically to resume all
of this after a battle, right? There were severalpeople who died because they were using amulets,
and because they were using- They were playingboth sides. They were forbidden. But they were
(12:18):
playing both sides. They were fighting for Yahweh,but they were using the Baal's elements. So
in case they were wrong with God, they couldbe with Mal, so they were good with both sides.
And then something very, very beautiful happenedbecause when all those people died, at a certain
moment, they go and one of the Maccabees, thenoble Judas Maccabee exhorts everybody and
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says, see what happens when we are not faithful.People die. But there was something very, very
amazing that happens then because he did notonly pray. but also took a collection, sent
it to the temple in Jerusalem to provide fora sin offering. And this is the equivalent
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basically of sending money to the church andordering some masses to be celebrated for the
dead. So what they did at the time, there wasa sin offering. They didn't have, of course,
you know, I mean, infinite value of... of massand everything else, but whatever they could,
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they offered. It's the same idea of the indulgence.You offer a sacrifice for the church to give
you part of her treasure in order to offer toLord Jesus Christ for your deliverance. And
this point actually highlights another pointof Catholic doctrine, which is firstly the
idea that some Protestants have it, that wefall asleep. we die, we don't get judged until
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the end of the world. All right. Yes, the otherday we heard that, just in some protestant
program, whatever, it was saying that our ladycannot hear, cannot listen in heaven because
she's sleeping. Or she's dead. Use the term,she's dead. They're all sleeping, waiting for
the resurrection, so as a result, they cannothear. It's a dead zone, there's no saints.
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There's nobody, there's nobody in heaven. Sothe soul dies and then resurrects? Resurrects
at the end of the- No, sleeps for- Then wakesup later on and then there's the judgment.
There's nothing in between. It's not clear ifthey can hear you then, but that's- They can't
hear you because they're snoring. But the, no,the element here is that when the people in
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Maccabees, they had died, so their lives weresealed. And the fact that you can pray, as
a community, as a person, in the institutionalchurch or the temple at the time, and pray
for their forgiveness of sin. That changes thewhole perspective, because if your faith is
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solely on the position of once saved, alwayssaved, then this doesn't work. This is heretical.
If it has to do with my own personal relationshipwith God, it also fails, because this has nothing
to do with my relationship with God, it's withmy community's relationship with God. And this
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is why Maccabees is so complicated for thesepeople. And that's for that reason that Maccabees
was excluded, was cut out of the Bible, becauseit complicates core beliefs. And in that element
of taking away those core beliefs, their wholecastle begins to fall down. So it's easier
to remove books than it is to come to gripswith those realities. We're still with the
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same problem. We haven't talked about this.In the end of the story, indulgences were invented.
to make money for the Church or not. Let's goto a quick infomercial and then we can... Salve
Maria, I'm Father Ryan Murphy of the Heraldsof the Gospel, and I'm delighted to extend
an invitation to each and every one of you.In the midst of our busy lives, it's crucial
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to take a moment of reflection, of soullessend of prayer. That's why I would like to personally
invite you to join us every day at 3 p.m. fora special... and powerful devotion, the Divine
Mercy Chaplet. The Divine Mercy Chaplet is abeautiful prayer that embodies the boundless
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compassion of our Lord. It's a time to cometogether as a community, regardless of where
we are, and lift up our intentions, our hopes,and even our burdens to the heart of Jesus.
Imagine all around the world, countless voices.uniting in prayer at this very hour. It's a
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moment of connection, of spiritual unity, andof seeking God's mercy in a troubled world.
So mark your calendars, set your alarms, andmake a commitment to join us each day at 3
p.m. Tune in and experience the transformativepower of the Divine Mercy Chaplet. Let this
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be a sanctuary of peace. amidst the noise oflife. Thank you for being a part of our Herald's
Canada YouTube channel. Together, let's embarkon this journey of faith, hope and mercy. I'm
looking forward to praying with you every dayat 3 p.m. May God's love and mercy shine upon
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you always. And until we meet again, may AlmightyGod bless you, the Father and the Son and the
Holy Spirit. Amen. So we are back then withthree common myths about the indulgences. And
how many people talk badly about the CatholicChurch, right? So the myth number one that
is very common, indulgences were invented tomake money for the church. What do we say?
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Well, if this is true, then there is no church,because it's an evil attitude. So if the church
has an evil attitude, it's not the church. Thechurch is the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ
cannot be evil. So obviously this is wrong.The intention of the church was to help the
people to get their debt paid. But Father, theindulgences did not start in the 1500s when
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Martin Luther came up. No, it was much earlier.Comes from a long time before. The problem
is that there was a misunderstanding at thetime in which, yes, some clerics were kind
of selling. No? They did something that thechurch was not promoting, and they were selling
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and giving the impression to the people thatif you give some money, you can take somebody
out of hell, which is completely wrong. That'snothing to do with indulgence. Indulgence cannot
take anyone from hell. Indulgence can take someonefrom purgatory and can help you if you are
still alive and the indulgence is for you, canhelp you to pay the debt that you have to pay
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because of your sins. So you can pay them byyour effort, or you can pay them out of the
kindness of the church. So they have the tworesources. So the church is doing everything
to save the souls. And that's the mission ofthe church, and that's the real church. The
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church is the one who wants to save the soulsand take them to heaven. Sickness, like sin,
has always existed in a sense, right? We maysay nowadays, many people say that, that modern
pharmaceutical industry, it's very corrupted,it's money grabbing and everything else. But
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basically, to deny the indulgences just becausesome bad representatives committed mistakes
or did wrong things, is like saying that medicineis not needed, should be debunked, just because
big pharma has people who are also bad represented.Of course, exactly. If one medicine or one
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doctor is not good, does it mean that medicineis something wrong, no? Is something good?
The sickness exists. Medication, we need medication.So the same thing, sin exists. The church needs
to provide the medication and the forgivenessof God for that. Bad representatives or not,
still indulgence is hold, of course, biblicallyand everything else. It's a beautiful side
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of the motherly side of the Church. The Churchwants so much salvation of the faithful that
she is ready to give everything from herself.It's like the pelican that gives out of his
own blood. So the Church is ready to give thetreasure of the Mary's of the Lord Jesus Christ
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and of the saints that they have acquired foryou. to be safe, for you to be able to get
out of purgatory if you are there. Another bigmyth that is the second one we have today is
someone can buy his way out of hell using indulgences.Whether Justin, is that something we can say
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or? Indulgences only work on living persons.So their soul has to be alive. It has to be
able to receive. grace. It has to be activein the mystical body of Christ. If the soul
is dead, dead through mortal sin, it does notwork. It is unable to react, and therefore
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the indulgences don't work on it. A soul thatis dead can't receive gazillion indulgences.
It doesn't help. The person needs that key ofresurrection, and that resurrection is sacramental
confession. So it's a real miss normal of sortsto even go in that direction. Because, and
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a lot of times this comes from the housewifesituation where they see their impious husband
and they say they do all kinds of prayers sayingthat somehow he will go to heaven because I'm
based on my prayers. No, he needs to be alive.He needs the participation. If there's no participation,
there's nothing happen. She might be just gainingher own salvation, absolutely, through prayer
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and through sacrifice and struggle, et cetera.That will gain her heaven. The other person
has to participate in it. And that's what themis-concept falls into. So if you are in mortal
sin, you cannot receive any indulgence becauseit doesn't make sense. If you are in mortal
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sin, it means that you need to be first forgiven.of the eternal punishment for them to be able
to pay the temporal punishment. You have tostart paying some debts. Exactly. So the first
one is to be alive. Myth number three, whichis no less than the two before, a person can
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buy indulgences for sins not yet committed.Well, that would be wonderful. That doesn't
make any sense. So what is it you just kindof get these like vouchers for the future.
When I do kill you, I'm forgiven. What aboutintention? What about the... So it means that
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indulgence is something that will allow youto sin. That doesn't make any sense. How the
church will allow you to sin. So I can buy apermission to commit up to five, six mortal
sins. If I buy the bigger package, I get a hundred.That was wonderful. Madness. But unfortunately,
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there wasn't an idea that fell into place. Therewere cases of people in certain places that
would go to confession before they went outin a situation that could have been an occasion
of sin and confess where they were going sothat they would get prior forgiveness, kind
of a get out of jail free card. Yeah, the Catholicdoctrine has a very nice, nice word and says
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that indulgences are not a permission to commitsins. Exactly. But rather is something to,
is an act of love by the church to help us getwhere we have to if we come to the mercy of
God. If I go to a place where they have rampant,uh, bubonic plague or something of the sorts,
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and I take the cure. a week before thinkingthat it'll make me strong against the disease.
No, it won't do anything. It'll probably makeme sick because I don't have it. And then make,
and I still will catch it on the other side.It doesn't make sense. Very beautiful stories
and examples about the different aspects ofpurgatory. There is one here, Father, that
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talks about Padre Pio. I don't know if we wouldlike to tell the audience. Yes. No, tell it.
I do. Now because Padre Pio was praying oneday in San Giovanni Rotondo and then he all
of a sudden he sees One of the monks that hehad never seen He says oh, how come I do not
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know this monkey he knew and then he realizedthat he was the only one seeing him Because
he had been one of the monks that had died manyyears before in a fire That for some reason
had been committed by I mean some fault of someoneor maybe his, but then he appeared with the
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permission of asking Padre Pio to pray for him,so he would abandon. And there are many, many
cases like that in the history of the church.Because those who are in purgatory, they rely
on the prayers and the sacrifices and the indulgencesthat can be given by those who are on earth,
and they are able to get merits for the others.When you're in purgatory, you cannot do anything
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for you. You can do things for the others, yes,but not for you. You rely on the church to
pray for you, to give you indulgences, to helpyou to get out of purgatory. Now, beautiful,
there is another case too. St. Mary of Lacocque,you know, the one that is the saint to whom
the Sacred Heart of Jesus gave so many revelations.And then one day she's praying and also she
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sees a former superior of the convent that alsowas in Purgatory for a long, long time. And
what had happened was that, yeah, she was notcareful with the people she should take care
of. And so she was, yeah, she liked charity.And so she was there in Purgatory. And the
only way to come out was that St. Mary wouldpray for her. And sure enough, finally, she
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appears to her prior to go to go into heaven,and then she is all luminous and everything
else comes to thank. The church is very generousand gives us this opportunity to get indulgence
for us and for the others, and we need to takeadvantage of this. But we can also be a poor
person, a common person. You don't have to beSt. Padre Pio. We don't have to be St. Margaret
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Mary. And yet there was a story of the poorfarmer father. That one is really, really nice.
He was a common person and all the time whilefarming used to pray for the souls in purgatory.
One afternoon in heaven, he sees a score ofsouls going to heaven, very luminous, very
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beautiful and everything else. And then oneof them turns and says, thank you very much.
It was because of your prayers and now we aregoing to heaven. So we can be a person who
never went to school, is a poor farmer or somethinglike that, but yet we still can pray for the
souls in purgatory, right? That's a tremendouscharity, act of charity. Kindness, tenderness,
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this is what the church is all about. It's really,really beautiful. So to deny indulgences is
to deny an aspect of tenderness of the church.It's to be just and not to be merciful. Well,
then it's not justice. Of course. Because whenjustice isn't linked to mercy, it's not justice.
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mercy if it's not linked to justice. Those twovirtues are twins, very much attached. It's
tyranny, no? Tyranny, it's brutality. Brutality.And mercy without justice is softness. It's
the wrong form of indulgence. Maybe, Father,we can wrap up then the episode today. There
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is this beautiful prayer by St. Gertrude theGreat. She was a Benedictine nun and she...
has this prayer, if you permit, you can readit says, eternal father, I offer thee the most
precious blood of thy divine son Jesus in unionwith the masses said throughout the world today.
For all the holy souls in purgatory, for sinnerseverywhere, for sinners in the universal church,
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those in my own home and within my family, amen.Single prayer, beautiful short prayer, and
yet how proper.
Very theological because actually she's offeringthe merits of the church, which is our Lord
Jesus Christ and the saints, for the souls ofProgat. This is the best thing that you can
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offer. Much more than not having sugar withyour coffee, etc., which is nice, but it's
nothing compared to offering the merits of Mary,of Saint Joseph, of the saints, and of course
of our Lord Jesus Christ. And it goes prettymuch in the line of the Daily Divine Mercy
Chaplet, right? She's kind of from before, butyet goes in the same line. We invite everybody
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to join us every day at three o'clock in theevening, by the way. The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit. May Almighty God blessyou, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Amen. Go in peace. Thanks be to God.
Even among Catholics, there is a lot of confusionabout indulgences. For some, it is a Catholic
scam. For others, it's like someone trying tosell you real estate in heaven. And for others,
it's just something that doesn't have anythingto do because we do not need any mercy. So
today in this program, we're going to find outwhat are indulgences for, how they stand in
(00:23):
the Bible from the Bible perspective, and alsowhat the Catholic doctrine has to tell us.
Welcome to Salve Maria, the podcast of the Heraldsof the Gospel.
Maria, Father. Hallelujah. Hallelujah, BrotherJustin. Salve Maria. Fr. Arthur, what exactly,
(00:45):
let's start with that for our audience, whatexactly indulgences are? Okay, so indulgence
comes from Latin. It's a Latin word that meanskindness, tender. It means something that is
given out of the kindness of the Church forthe good of the soul.
(01:10):
and we are guilty of an eternal punishment.That guilt, we can only take it away by sacramental
confession. So the confession will give us thepardon of our guilt over the eternal damnation.
(01:31):
But we also have to pay a debt because of thesin, and that is called a temporal debt. So
to pay the debt, the priest in confession givesus a penance. But there are other things also
that we can do, other than the penance of thepriest, to pay our debt for our sins, mortal
(01:54):
or venial. And this is where the indulgencecomes in. It's in paying the debt. It's not
the forgiveness of the sin. The forgivenessof the sin can only be done in sacramental
confession. And this is something very, veryimportant that unfortunately wasn't clear.
as we are going to see in a few minutes, inthe Catholic world in the 16th, 15th century
(02:23):
and originated a great confusion, a terriblething for the church, but the church never
intended to say what Protestants unfortunatelythink. Protestants think one thing, but we
never said that. We don't mean that. So, it'snot just to help us to pay for the debt. of
(02:44):
our sins. The penance that we need to pay forour sins. This penance we can do it on earth,
arms giving, acts of charity, prayers, sacrifices,etc. Or we can do it in our life after death,
(03:06):
meaning purgatory. So we can pay the debt inpurgatory if we haven't paid the debt already.
in our life on earth by our penance and by acceptingthe indulgences that the church gives us out
of her kindness and tenderness. I think it'sreally important when we look at the question
(03:27):
of indulgences. In some of the 18th centuryhighest devotions, there was some really astronomical
amount of days placed on certain prayers oractions. But the idea was, what Jesus mentioned,
(03:48):
was that people would be pulled out of hell.So it was some way in which you could pray
for a relative who was really, really objectivelybad and you could stop them from going to hell
and bring them to heaven. Or you could ringin someone who's already in hell and by praying
this prayer that gives you 70 years and youjust keep praying until you accomplish… miracle
(04:14):
and you quench that element. Or a plenary indulgenceby which supposedly you will be taking somebody
out of hell, which is completely ridiculous.No, but the key is that it is based on the
premise that the person already is in a goodstate of soul. That means that they have gone
to sacramental confession, they have receivedabsolution of their mortal sins. They may have
(04:39):
vigno, right? Their soul may be sick. but theirsoul's not dead. And that changes the whole
scenario. A person in the state of Vinylsson,not immortal, if they were to die at that moment,
they would end up in purgatory. Which meansthey're on, they are saved, they are going
to go to heaven, but they have a period wherethey need purgation, they need to be corrected.
(05:00):
And that is where the role of indulgence isfallen to. But this looks like always an invention
of the Catholic Church. And the tractors saythat, but also Protestants as well. And people
who are not familiar with the Catholic doctrinealso tend to accuse the church of, again, grabbing
money out of selling something that is in heaven.So today- It's in the gospel. Yes, of course.
(05:21):
No, no, totally in the gospel, in the Bibletoo. So today we're going to exactly see the
reasons and the principles briefly, of course,because otherwise people just stay until the
end because we also have three myths about indulgencesthat are so wrong that need to be debunked.
But the first one, for instance, indulgences,right? They are right because- we have a penance
(05:42):
to pay, on earth, after sin. And also becausewe not only feel guilty when we commit a sin,
right? But also there is something, if we donot clear, there is something for the whole
eternity. So the prophet Isaiah here has something,right? God himself says, I will punish the
(06:02):
world for its evil. So when there is sin, thereis punishment. We cannot deny it. And the wicked
for their iniquity. There is also, you know,every time people commit a sin, there is a
consequence. And I will put an end to the prayerof the arrogant and lay low the insolence of
tyrants. And even more, Father, Ecclesiastessays, for God will bring every deed into judgment,
(06:27):
including every secret thing, whether good orevil. So there are consequences for eternal
life, correct? The need to be clear. Of course.They have to be paid. So have to be forgiven.
And once it is forgiven, you have to pay
(06:48):
the temporal punishment because of that sin.That can be as long or short or whatever. It's
out of God's justice. So the innuendoes arenot something that is very precise because
it depends on what God decides. He knows whichpenance. deserves each sin and each sin is
(07:13):
different and depends on who does it, when hedoes it, at what time, what intention. Even
intention can be the same act, but differentintention can be a different sin. So God will
decide, but we can offer the church helps theperson to offer to God something in reparation
(07:34):
of that sin. Another thing also to rememberis that once we've died, Time is no longer
an issue. So even when these indulgences havea timeframe place on them, it's a figurative
manner because it isn't something which, thereis no such thing as a day in purgatory or in
(07:56):
heaven. It's eternity. Precisely. So you don'thave that. And that's where some of the detractors
get in. They say, well, what is this business?It's one year or 50 days or whatever. It's
a period, it's very similar to the problem.It's a point of reference. But actually, just
to clarify, there is no point of referencesanymore in the sense of 100 days, 30 days.
(08:19):
It doesn't exist. And that was the problem,which is that they were trying to give, as
in Genesis, the element that is the seven days.Why? Because we humans work our lives based
on days, time. But eternity doesn't have to.No, of course, doesn't make sense. So, but
it's more for our purpose than anyone else's.Our understanding, our sensitivities. So, out
(08:46):
of the treasure of the church, which is thetreasure of the church, is the merits of our
Lord Jesus Christ plus the saints. That is atreasure. The church has this treasure, and
who can dispose of this treasure? He's not theowner of the treasure, but he can use it. The
pope, the authority. And this is where someegalitarian philosophy of the 16th century
(09:12):
comes in, in which they do not want to acceptthat the church can on earth do what the Lord
Jesus Christ was doing on earth, that He's thecontinuation of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
He has the authority that others don't have.But the Pope, yes, because he is the vicar
of our Lord Jesus Christ, and he can disposeof this treasure and give this treasure to
(09:35):
some people. who ask for mercy, who ask forindulgence, and the Pope gives this indulgence
that they can use in order to pay their debt.For instance, Father, here we have John 20
that says, Jesus said to them again, Peace bewith you, receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive
the sins of any, they are forgiven them. Andif you retain the sins of any, they are retained.
(10:00):
So the Church has authority to grant these.indulgences. Absolutely, it's beautiful. So
the pope and of course the bishops also, andeventually the pope can give to other members
of the church the power to a certain degreeto give an indulgence. This is a very kind
(10:22):
of delicate issue, but the... So mainly thepope has this authority to use this of all
the merits of all of Jesus Christ and give themto the people in order to save them for eternity,
to help them to pay the debts that they haveto pay on earth or in Purgatory. And this is
(10:45):
something very nice because you can get someintelligence that you can get from somebody
who is in Purgatory, somebody that you thinkthat he is in Purgatory. So you can do this
prayer or this act of piety. that you can doand you can offer this to our Lord Jesus Christ
(11:07):
for the benefit of such and such. Of courseour Lord Jesus Christ will decide ultimately
if he's going to use it for him or not. Becausemaybe this person is not impurgatory. You don't
know. So our Lord Jesus Christ can use it forsomebody else. Father, a very beautiful example
is the famous Book of Maccabees that some ofour in our audience have already heard. Well,
(11:31):
because we commented another program, but stillit would be very, very nice to quote the two
parts of it. Because the Book of Maccabees isone of the proofs that the Catholic Church
uses to show how our prayers here on earth canalso be applied to people who have died, right?
And unfortunately some people took these booksout of the Bible, no? Yes, the second Book
(11:52):
of Maccabees, only Catholic Bibles follow it,while the others chopped them. But yeah, if
we go to the second book of Maccabees, chapter12, and then it says, basically to resume all
of this after a battle, right? There were severalpeople who died because they were using amulets,
and because they were using- They were playingboth sides. They were forbidden. But they were
(12:18):
playing both sides. They were fighting for Yahweh,but they were using the Baal's elements. So
in case they were wrong with God, they couldbe with Mal, so they were good with both sides.
And then something very, very beautiful happenedbecause when all those people died, at a certain
moment, they go and one of the Maccabees, thenoble Judas Maccabee exhorts everybody and
(12:42):
says, see what happens when we are not faithful.People die. But there was something very, very
amazing that happens then because he did notonly pray. but also took a collection, sent
it to the temple in Jerusalem to provide fora sin offering. And this is the equivalent
(13:04):
basically of sending money to the church andordering some masses to be celebrated for the
dead. So what they did at the time, there wasa sin offering. They didn't have, of course,
you know, I mean, infinite value of... of massand everything else, but whatever they could,
(13:26):
they offered. It's the same idea of the indulgence.You offer a sacrifice for the church to give
you part of her treasure in order to offer toLord Jesus Christ for your deliverance. And
this point actually highlights another pointof Catholic doctrine, which is firstly the
idea that some Protestants have it, that wefall asleep. we die, we don't get judged until
(13:53):
the end of the world. All right. Yes, the otherday we heard that, just in some protestant
program, whatever, it was saying that our ladycannot hear, cannot listen in heaven because
she's sleeping. Or she's dead. Use the term,she's dead. They're all sleeping, waiting for
the resurrection, so as a result, they cannothear. It's a dead zone, there's no saints.
(14:15):
There's nobody, there's nobody in heaven. Sothe soul dies and then resurrects? Resurrects
at the end of the- No, sleeps for- Then wakesup later on and then there's the judgment.
There's nothing in between. It's not clear ifthey can hear you then, but that's- They can't
hear you because they're snoring. But the, no,the element here is that when the people in
(14:38):
Maccabees, they had died, so their lives weresealed. And the fact that you can pray, as
a community, as a person, in the institutionalchurch or the temple at the time, and pray
for their forgiveness of sin. That changes thewhole perspective, because if your faith is
(15:02):
solely on the position of once saved, alwayssaved, then this doesn't work. This is heretical.
If it has to do with my own personal relationshipwith God, it also fails, because this has nothing
to do with my relationship with God, it's withmy community's relationship with God. And this
(15:24):
is why Maccabees is so complicated for thesepeople. And that's for that reason that Maccabees
was excluded, was cut out of the Bible, becauseit complicates core beliefs. And in that element
of taking away those core beliefs, their wholecastle begins to fall down. So it's easier
to remove books than it is to come to gripswith those realities. We're still with the
(15:47):
same problem. We haven't talked about this.In the end of the story, indulgences were invented.
to make money for the Church or not. Let's goto a quick infomercial and then we can... Salve
Maria, I'm Father Ryan Murphy of the Heraldsof the Gospel, and I'm delighted to extend
an invitation to each and every one of you.In the midst of our busy lives, it's crucial
(16:11):
to take a moment of reflection, of soullessend of prayer. That's why I would like to personally
invite you to join us every day at 3 p.m. fora special... and powerful devotion, the Divine
Mercy Chaplet. The Divine Mercy Chaplet is abeautiful prayer that embodies the boundless
(16:31):
compassion of our Lord. It's a time to cometogether as a community, regardless of where
we are, and lift up our intentions, our hopes,and even our burdens to the heart of Jesus.
Imagine all around the world, countless voices.uniting in prayer at this very hour. It's a
(16:53):
moment of connection, of spiritual unity, andof seeking God's mercy in a troubled world.
So mark your calendars, set your alarms, andmake a commitment to join us each day at 3
p.m. Tune in and experience the transformativepower of the Divine Mercy Chaplet. Let this
(17:17):
be a sanctuary of peace. amidst the noise oflife. Thank you for being a part of our Herald's
Canada YouTube channel. Together, let's embarkon this journey of faith, hope and mercy. I'm
looking forward to praying with you every dayat 3 p.m. May God's love and mercy shine upon
(17:40):
you always. And until we meet again, may AlmightyGod bless you, the Father and the Son and the
Holy Spirit. Amen. So we are back then withthree common myths about the indulgences. And
how many people talk badly about the CatholicChurch, right? So the myth number one that
is very common, indulgences were invented tomake money for the church. What do we say?
(18:03):
Well, if this is true, then there is no church,because it's an evil attitude. So if the church
has an evil attitude, it's not the church. Thechurch is the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ
cannot be evil. So obviously this is wrong.The intention of the church was to help the
people to get their debt paid. But Father, theindulgences did not start in the 1500s when
(18:29):
Martin Luther came up. No, it was much earlier.Comes from a long time before. The problem
is that there was a misunderstanding at thetime in which, yes, some clerics were kind
of selling. No? They did something that thechurch was not promoting, and they were selling
(18:52):
and giving the impression to the people thatif you give some money, you can take somebody
out of hell, which is completely wrong. That'snothing to do with indulgence. Indulgence cannot
take anyone from hell. Indulgence can take someonefrom purgatory and can help you if you are
still alive and the indulgence is for you, canhelp you to pay the debt that you have to pay
(19:15):
because of your sins. So you can pay them byyour effort, or you can pay them out of the
kindness of the church. So they have the tworesources. So the church is doing everything
to save the souls. And that's the mission ofthe church, and that's the real church. The
(19:36):
church is the one who wants to save the soulsand take them to heaven. Sickness, like sin,
has always existed in a sense, right? We maysay nowadays, many people say that, that modern
pharmaceutical industry, it's very corrupted,it's money grabbing and everything else. But
(19:57):
basically, to deny the indulgences just becausesome bad representatives committed mistakes
or did wrong things, is like saying that medicineis not needed, should be debunked, just because
big pharma has people who are also bad represented.Of course, exactly. If one medicine or one
(20:20):
doctor is not good, does it mean that medicineis something wrong, no? Is something good?
The sickness exists. Medication, we need medication.So the same thing, sin exists. The church needs
to provide the medication and the forgivenessof God for that. Bad representatives or not,
still indulgence is hold, of course, biblicallyand everything else. It's a beautiful side
(20:48):
of the motherly side of the Church. The Churchwants so much salvation of the faithful that
she is ready to give everything from herself.It's like the pelican that gives out of his
own blood. So the Church is ready to give thetreasure of the Mary's of the Lord Jesus Christ
(21:10):
and of the saints that they have acquired foryou. to be safe, for you to be able to get
out of purgatory if you are there. Another bigmyth that is the second one we have today is
someone can buy his way out of hell using indulgences.Whether Justin, is that something we can say
(21:34):
or? Indulgences only work on living persons.So their soul has to be alive. It has to be
able to receive. grace. It has to be activein the mystical body of Christ. If the soul
is dead, dead through mortal sin, it does notwork. It is unable to react, and therefore
(21:58):
the indulgences don't work on it. A soul thatis dead can't receive gazillion indulgences.
It doesn't help. The person needs that key ofresurrection, and that resurrection is sacramental
confession. So it's a real miss normal of sortsto even go in that direction. Because, and
(22:22):
a lot of times this comes from the housewifesituation where they see their impious husband
and they say they do all kinds of prayers sayingthat somehow he will go to heaven because I'm
based on my prayers. No, he needs to be alive.He needs the participation. If there's no participation,
there's nothing happen. She might be just gainingher own salvation, absolutely, through prayer
(22:44):
and through sacrifice and struggle, et cetera.That will gain her heaven. The other person
has to participate in it. And that's what themis-concept falls into. So if you are in mortal
sin, you cannot receive any indulgence becauseit doesn't make sense. If you are in mortal
(23:04):
sin, it means that you need to be first forgiven.of the eternal punishment for them to be able
to pay the temporal punishment. You have tostart paying some debts. Exactly. So the first
one is to be alive. Myth number three, whichis no less than the two before, a person can
(23:28):
buy indulgences for sins not yet committed.Well, that would be wonderful. That doesn't
make any sense. So what is it you just kindof get these like vouchers for the future.
When I do kill you, I'm forgiven. What aboutintention? What about the... So it means that
(23:50):
indulgence is something that will allow youto sin. That doesn't make any sense. How the
church will allow you to sin. So I can buy apermission to commit up to five, six mortal
sins. If I buy the bigger package, I get a hundred.That was wonderful. Madness. But unfortunately,
(24:12):
there wasn't an idea that fell into place. Therewere cases of people in certain places that
would go to confession before they went outin a situation that could have been an occasion
of sin and confess where they were going sothat they would get prior forgiveness, kind
of a get out of jail free card. Yeah, the Catholicdoctrine has a very nice, nice word and says
(24:37):
that indulgences are not a permission to commitsins. Exactly. But rather is something to,
is an act of love by the church to help us getwhere we have to if we come to the mercy of
God. If I go to a place where they have rampant,uh, bubonic plague or something of the sorts,
(25:01):
and I take the cure. a week before thinkingthat it'll make me strong against the disease.
No, it won't do anything. It'll probably makeme sick because I don't have it. And then make,
and I still will catch it on the other side.It doesn't make sense. Very beautiful stories
and examples about the different aspects ofpurgatory. There is one here, Father, that
(25:25):
talks about Padre Pio. I don't know if we wouldlike to tell the audience. Yes. No, tell it.
I do. Now because Padre Pio was praying oneday in San Giovanni Rotondo and then he all
of a sudden he sees One of the monks that hehad never seen He says oh, how come I do not
(25:45):
know this monkey he knew and then he realizedthat he was the only one seeing him Because
he had been one of the monks that had died manyyears before in a fire That for some reason
had been committed by I mean some fault of someoneor maybe his, but then he appeared with the
(26:07):
permission of asking Padre Pio to pray for him,so he would abandon. And there are many, many
cases like that in the history of the church.Because those who are in purgatory, they rely
on the prayers and the sacrifices and the indulgencesthat can be given by those who are on earth,
and they are able to get merits for the others.When you're in purgatory, you cannot do anything
(26:35):
for you. You can do things for the others, yes,but not for you. You rely on the church to
pray for you, to give you indulgences, to helpyou to get out of purgatory. Now, beautiful,
there is another case too. St. Mary of Lacocque,you know, the one that is the saint to whom
the Sacred Heart of Jesus gave so many revelations.And then one day she's praying and also she
(27:00):
sees a former superior of the convent that alsowas in Purgatory for a long, long time. And
what had happened was that, yeah, she was notcareful with the people she should take care
of. And so she was, yeah, she liked charity.And so she was there in Purgatory. And the
only way to come out was that St. Mary wouldpray for her. And sure enough, finally, she
(27:26):
appears to her prior to go to go into heaven,and then she is all luminous and everything
else comes to thank. The church is very generousand gives us this opportunity to get indulgence
for us and for the others, and we need to takeadvantage of this. But we can also be a poor
person, a common person. You don't have to beSt. Padre Pio. We don't have to be St. Margaret
(27:48):
Mary. And yet there was a story of the poorfarmer father. That one is really, really nice.
He was a common person and all the time whilefarming used to pray for the souls in purgatory.
One afternoon in heaven, he sees a score ofsouls going to heaven, very luminous, very
(28:09):
beautiful and everything else. And then oneof them turns and says, thank you very much.
It was because of your prayers and now we aregoing to heaven. So we can be a person who
never went to school, is a poor farmer or somethinglike that, but yet we still can pray for the
souls in purgatory, right? That's a tremendouscharity, act of charity. Kindness, tenderness,
(28:33):
this is what the church is all about. It's really,really beautiful. So to deny indulgences is
to deny an aspect of tenderness of the church.It's to be just and not to be merciful. Well,
then it's not justice. Of course. Because whenjustice isn't linked to mercy, it's not justice.
(29:00):
mercy if it's not linked to justice. Those twovirtues are twins, very much attached. It's
tyranny, no? Tyranny, it's brutality. Brutality.And mercy without justice is softness. It's
the wrong form of indulgence. Maybe, Father,we can wrap up then the episode today. There
(29:22):
is this beautiful prayer by St. Gertrude theGreat. She was a Benedictine nun and she...
has this prayer, if you permit, you can readit says, eternal father, I offer thee the most
precious blood of thy divine son Jesus in unionwith the masses said throughout the world today.
For all the holy souls in purgatory, for sinnerseverywhere, for sinners in the universal church,
(29:45):
those in my own home and within my family, amen.Single prayer, beautiful short prayer, and
yet how proper.
Very theological because actually she's offeringthe merits of the church, which is our Lord
Jesus Christ and the saints, for the souls ofProgat. This is the best thing that you can
(30:07):
offer. Much more than not having sugar withyour coffee, etc., which is nice, but it's
nothing compared to offering the merits of Mary,of Saint Joseph, of the saints, and of course
of our Lord Jesus Christ. And it goes prettymuch in the line of the Daily Divine Mercy
Chaplet, right? She's kind of from before, butyet goes in the same line. We invite everybody
(30:32):
to join us every day at three o'clock in theevening, by the way. The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit. May Almighty God blessyou, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Amen. Go in peace. Thanks be to God.
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