You Probably Believe in Purgatory

Even if you think you don’t

Gary Hoge

I’m convinced that just about every Christian believes in Purgatory. They just don’t know it because they don’t know what Purgatory is.

An Evangelical relative once told me she thought Purgatory was a place where the unsaved could go after they die so that Catholics could “pray them into heaven.”

That’s not even close.

To put it in Protestant terms, Purgatory is simply the final stage of sanctification. According to the Evangelical, non-denominational website “gotquestions.org”:

Sanctification is a three-stage process – past, present, and future. The first stage occurs at the beginning of our Christian lives. It is an initial moral change, a break from the power and love of sin. It is the point at which believers can count themselves “dead to sin but alive to God” (Romans 6:11). Once sanctification has begun, we are no longer under sin’s dominion (Romans 6:14). There is a reorientation of desires, and we develop a love of righteousness. Paul calls it “slavery to righteousness” (Romans 6:17-18).

 

The second stage of sanctification requires a lifetime to complete. As we grow in grace, we are gradually – but steadily – changing to be more like Jesus (2 Corinthians 3:18). This occurs in a process of daily spiritual renewal (Colossians 3:10). The apostle Paul himself was being sanctified even as he ministered to others. Paul claimed that he had not reached perfection, but that he “pressed on” to attain everything Christ desired for him (Philippians 3:12).¹

Our sanctification must be completed before we can enter Heaven. In Scripture we are told to “pursue … the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14), and we are told that “nothing impure will ever enter” Heaven (Revelation 21:27). The city of the living God is said to be the abode of “the spirits of the righteous made perfect” (Hebrews 12:22-23).

As explained above, the process of our sanctification begins in life, but what if, as is usually the case, we are not perfectly sanctified by the time we die? According to “gotquestions.org,”

The third and final stage of sanctification occurs in the future. When believers die, their spirits go to be with Christ (2 Corinthians 5:6-8). Since nothing unclean can enter heaven (Revelation 21:27), we must be made perfect at that point.²

Being “made perfect at that point,” that is, after death, is what Catholics call “Purgatory.” That’s really all it is. It is the third and final stage of our sanctification. 

Most people think the word “Purgatory” refers to a place, and it has evolved to include that meaning, but primarily it refers to the final purification of the elect by which we are cleansed of whatever impurity remains when we die.

Over the centuries there’s been a lot of speculation about it: Does it take years? Days? Moments? Does time even have any meaning in the afterlife? Does it occur in a separate place in the afterlife? We don’t know. Everything we do know is stated in the following two sentences from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

1030 All who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.

 

1031 The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned.³

That’s basically the same thing “gotquestions.org” said about the third and final stage of sanctification. And that’s why I say that just about all Christians believe in Purgatory, even if they think they don’t. 

Like most Evangelicals, “gotquestions.org” thinks they don’t believe in Purgatory, despite what they wrote about sanctification. In an article on Purgatory, they wrote,

Purgatory is understood by Catholics as a place of cleansing in preparation for heaven because they do not recognize that because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we are already cleansed, declared righteous, forgiven, redeemed, reconciled, and sanctified.⁴

So, when discussing sanctification, they acknowledge that “since nothing unclean can enter heaven (Revelation 21:27), we must be made perfect at that point,”⁵ that is, after death. But when discussing Purgatory, they deny that we need to be made perfect after death because we are “already cleansed … and sanctified.”⁶ 

They were right the first time.

Perhaps part of the problem is that there’s an element of suffering involved in Purgatory, and they think that’s incompatible with the suffering of Christ on our behalf:

Jesus suffered for our sins so that we could be delivered from suffering. To say that we must also suffer for our sins is to say that Jesus’ suffering was insufficient. To say that we must atone for our sins by cleansing in Purgatory is to deny the sufficiency of the atoning sacrifice of Jesus.⁷

But that’s not quite right. Jesus suffered for our sins so that we could be freed from eternal damnation, not freed from all suffering. In fact, the sanctification about which we’ve been talking is often brought about by suffering. Scripture bears that out:

My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it (Hebrews 12:5-11, emphasis added).

That’s the essence of Purgatory right there. God disciplines us in a way that does not seem pleasant at the time, but painful, in order that we may share in his holiness and attain “the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14).

Jesus’ suffering, far from being insufficient, was enough to redeem the whole world. It is his suffering that makes our redemption and sanctification possible. But as the passage from Hebrews makes clear, the process of our sanctification will not always be comfortable and pain-free.

To recap, we all believe that our sanctification begins at conversion, continues as “he who began a good work in [us] will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6), and must be completed before we can enter Heaven. We Catholics just have a word to describe the completion of that process.

So, if you believe what “gotquestions.org” said about sanctification, you believe in Purgatory, even if, like them, you don’t think you do.