Day 203: The Purpose of Indulgences (1474-1484)

• It’s Day 203!!

• IN THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS

• OBTAINING INDULGENCE FROM GOD THROUGH THE CHURCH

• We are going to talk some more about the Communion of Saints and obtaining indulgences

• THE CELEBRATION OF THE SACRAMENT OF PENANCE

• What is the form?

• What is the matter?

• What is going on during the celebration of the sacrament of Reconciliation?

• How do we actually go to Confession?

• How does that take place here in the West and in other liturgies, not just the Latin rite

• So let’s pray!!

Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven, we praise you and glorify your name. We thank you so much. Again, let our time begin with praise. Let thanksgiving and praise go up first. Help us to praise you when we are thriving and when it’s easy to forget you. Help us praise you when we are struggling and it’s difficult to see you. Lord God, help us to praise you when we need your mercy. And help us to praise you when we have received your mercy. Help us in this day to walk in grace. Help us this day to recognize that we are not alone. We are surrounded by the great cloud of witnesses, the Church. And help us to take that next step, whatever that next step is, to grow closer and closer to you and your Sacred Heart, your merciful heart. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen”

• So there we have it!!

• When we seek to be forgiven of our sins and be holy with the help of God’s grace, we are not alone

• IT IS SO IMPORTANT!!

• Paragraph 1474 says, “The Christian who seeks to purify himself of his sin and to become holy with the help of God’s grace is not alone.”

• We are not just individual Christian automatons

• We are not on our own

• Yes, we are individuals

• God loves us as if we were the only one to exist

• AND YET…

• What has God done?

• He has brought us not only into individual personal relationship with Him

• He has brought us into communion with His Church

• He has brought us into the community of the faithful

• He has brought us into the Communion of Saints

• What we do affects other people

• Paragraph 1475 says, “In the communion of saints, ‘a perennial link of charity exists between the faithful who have already reached their heavenly home, those who are expiating their sins in purgatory and those who are still pilgrims on earth. Between them there is, too, an abundant exchange of all good things. In this wonderful exchange, the holiness of one profits others, well beyond the harm that the sin of one could cause others.”

• Not only can the saints in Heaven intercede for us…

• Not only can the saints in Heaven pray for those souls in Purgatory…

• BUT…

• WE can also pray for the souls in Purgatory

• IN FACT…

• If we are the body, when one member suffers we all suffer with him

• When one member is strengthened, we all rejoice

• That is 100% true

• BUT…

• Paragraph 1475 says, “In this wonderful exchange, the holiness of one profits others, well beyond the harm that the sin of one could cause others.”

• The holiness of the saints in Heaven and growing holiness of the holy ones in Purgatory benefits us more than a sinner rejecting God can hurt us

• There are limits to the way an individual can HURT the body

• BUT…

• There is NO LIMIT to the ways that a holy person could benefit the body

• THAT IS JUST SO BEAUTIFUL!!

• We are all linked in this WONDERFUL EXCHANGE

• The whole Body of Christ in Heaven called THE CHURCH TRIUMPHANT

• In Purgatory called THE CHURCH SUFFERING

• And on Earth called THE CHURCH MILITANT

• ONE CHURCH

• ONE BODY

• In this WONDERFUL EXCHANGE

• Paragraph 1475 says, “In this wonderful exchange, the holiness of one profits others, well beyond the harm that the sin of one could cause others.”

• SO POWERFUL!!

• Indulgences are mean to be remedial

• Every time we sin gravely, we have eternal consequences for that sin

• Eternal separation from God aka HELL

• We have temporal consequences due to sin

• Because of that, our hearts become attached to sin

• Our hearts become attached to things like CREATION instead of the CREATOR

• We love created things MORE than we love God in so many ways

• So purification, penances, and indulgences heal us from that

• We have FOUR ASPECTS TO AN INDULGENCE

• What are they?

• First is the action itself i.e., praying the Stations of the Cross or the Rosary

• Second is receiving Holy Communion

• Third is go to Confession within a week of that indulgence itself

• Fourth is interceding on behalf of the Holy Father, the Pope

• What makes these four aspects special?

• Holy Communion and Confession are special on their own

• Praying for anyone is special on its own

• All of them individually have power

• What gives them the capacity and ability to have a plenary or partial indulgence to remove all temporal punishments due to sin?

• THE AUTHORITY THAT JESUS GAVE TO THE CHURCH!!

• THIS IS SO IMPORTANT!!

• It is because Jesus Christ extended His authority to the Church when he gave the Church leaders the power of BINDING AND LOOSING

• THAT IS THE KEY!!

• It is so humble of the Lord God that He gives to human beings who are flawed and faulty and make a bunch of mistakes

• He gives them the capacity and ability to declare that we can do these things and through the Power and the Grace of the Holy Spirit working through the Church, we get a partial or plenary indulgence

• WHICH IS JUST INCREDIBLE!!

• What is the big deal with indulgences?

• What’s the problem with them?

• One is people will say that “Indulgences can be sold and that doesn’t seem right or fair or just.”

• Yes they are correct

• IN FACT…

• The Church NEVER TAUGHT that it was OK to sell indulgences

• THAT WAS NEVER A THING!!

• Let’s look at the context

• There are things that you can do for the indulgence like acts of penance, works of charity, or certain prayers

• It COSTS you something

• It DIVESTS you of something

• It divests you of your time

• It increases your prayer life

• It helps others

• As an example, imagine you do penance or fast for the next five Fridays and you get an indulgence (not sure if that is an indulgence, just using an example)

• That is good because you are disciplining yourself and removing yourself from attachments

• Or you could pray the Stations of the Cross in the Church on a Friday

• That could be a way of growing your relationship with the Lord

• Become MORE ATTACHED to God and LESS ATTACHED to created things

• Or donate to charity

• You’re not only divesting yourself of some things you may be attached to, but you are also helping your brothers and sisters

• Whenever we associate the spiritual life with money, there is always a danger

• The danger is people can often think that they are “buying their way into Heaven”

• AND YET…

• What’s the whole point of this?

• The whole point is ALMSGIVING

• Jesus even highlights the reality in the goodness of giving alms, giving material goods for the benefit of others

• If it’s money, then that is giving money for the benefit of others

• That could look, in a certain light,  like a person is purchasing their way to Heaven or buying holiness

• Now add to this the indulgence and it could look like a penitential act, prayer act, charitable act/almsgiving

• You know what?

• The Church needs HELP

• We are building this Church in Rome called St. Peter’s Basilica

• We need a lot of money to build this CHurch

• So the Church uses Her authority of binding and loosing to say if you donate to the building of the Church in Rome…

• (SQUIRREL!! 😉)

• For hundreds and hundreds of years, anyone can come and enjoy beauty and pray there

• It’s not the Pope’s private house

• You are building this incredible Church for the use of ALL OF THE CHURCH as well as people outside the Church

• (Back to Fr. Mike’s original thought… 😉)

• Ok if you donate to the building of this Church, there is an indulgence attached to that

• What does that sound like?

• If you are cynical, it sounds like you are buying grace or it sounds like you are buying an indulgence

• The Church is asking for some money and if you give this money, you’ll get an indulgence

• It sounds like purchasing a spiritual good

• AND YET…

• We know that purchasing spiritual goods is ABSOLUTELY PROHIBITED by the Church and by Scripture

• When the Church offered this, it did not think that

• BUT…

• You can imagine how people saw it like that

• THEY DID NOT SELL INDULGENCES!!

• But to suspicious, skeptical, or cynical eyes it could look like people were buying this spiritual good

• THAT WAS NEVER THE INTENTION OF THE CHURCH!!

• The second reason why non-Catholic Christians would have a problem with indulgences is this vision of salvation, this vision of justification and sanctification that is ONCE AND FOR ALL

• The sense of, “I have been imputed righteousness. God has simply declared me righteous. And so no matter what I do, I don’t grow in or lose my righteousness. I do not grow in justification. I do not grow in sanctification.”

• Some people say that is the case

• Some non-Catholic Christians say, “Once saved, always saved” and because of that, you do not need indulgences and God has imputed His grace on you

• As Catholics, we believe that we don’t have this imputation of Grace upon us 

• It is more INTRINSIC

• It is IN US that we have to either COOPERATE WITH IT 

• OR…

• We REFUSE to cooperate with it

• God gives us His Grace and we either say YES to it on a regular basis and we grow in His Grace

• OR…

• We say NO and we either stop growing or we fall away from God’s Grace

• Because of that, we need these gifts

• Because of this, the Church has given us the gifts of indulgences

• The Church has given us the gifts of penances that actually do some merit

• They actually do something in our lives

• Because of this, Jesus Christ has given us the Sacrament of Reconciliation

• THE CELEBRATION OF THE SACRAMENT OF PENANCE

• Paragraph 1480 says, “Like all the sacraments, Penance is a liturgical action. The elements of the celebration are ordinarily these: a greeting and blessing from the priest, reading the Word of God to illuminate the conscience and elicit contrition, and an exhortation to repentance; the confession, which acknowledges sins and makes them known to the priest; the imposition and acceptance of a penance; the priest’s absolution; a prayer of thanksgiving and praise and dismissal with the blessing of the priest.”

• Paragraph 1481 says, “The Byzantine Liturgy recognizes several formulas of absolution, in the form of invocation, which admirably expresses the mystery of forgiveness: ‘May the same God, who through the Prophet Nathan forgave David when he confessed his sins, who forgave Peter when he wept bitterly, the prostitute when she washed his feet with her tears, the publican, and the prodigal son, through me, a sinner, forgive you both in this life and in the next and enable you to appear before his awe-inspiring tribunal without condemnation, he who is blessed forever and ever. Amen.”

• Pray with Paragraph 1481

• Paragraphs 1482 to the end of today talk about how there is a sacrament of Reconciliation that can take place in the framework of a communal celebration

• It is a reconciliation service where everyone comes at the same time and you have the proclamation of the Word and maybe a homily and examination of conscience that everyone goes through and then everyone goes to individual Confession

• Reconciliation is a liturgical action

• Therefore, it is an ecclesial and public action

• It’s not just on Saturday afternoon when a person goes into “the box with the priest”

• Sometimes when we get together as a parish family and go to Confession together, there is something really visibly powerful about that

• It highlights the fact that WE ARE ONE

• WE ARE ONE BODY!!

• WE ARE ONE FAMILY!!

• WE ARE ONE PARISH!!

• Paragraph 1483 says, “In case of grave necessity recourse may be had to a communal celebration of reconciliation with general confession and general absolution. Grave necessity of this sort can arise when there is imminent danger of death without sufficient time for the priest or priests to hear each penitent’s confession. Grave necessity can also exist when, given the number of penitents, there are not enough confessors to hear individual confessions properly in a reasonable time, so that the penitents through no fault of their own would be deprived of sacramental grace or Holy Communion for a long time. In this case, for the absolution to be valid the faithful must have the intention of individually confessing their grave sins in the time required. The diocesan bishop is the judge of whether or not the conditions required for general absolution exist. A large gathering of the faithful on the occasion of major feasts or pilgrimages does not constitute a case of grave necessity.”

• This is where people say, “We are all guilty of all these sins.”

• They don’t necessarily name them individually

• Then the priests gives general absolution to everyone gathered there

• ONLY IN CASES OF GRAVE NECESSITY!!

• Like D-Day in World War II

• On Divine Mercy Sunday if there are 2 priests and 100 penitents, if the priest offered general absolution, he most likely would not have the authority to do that and he would not be right to do that

• General absolution is incredibly rare

• ONLY IN CASES OF GRAVE NECESSITY AND UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE DIOCESAN BISHOP!!

• We are the Body of Christ

• There are such things as indulgences and the Church gives us access to those graces through PRAYER, FASTING, ALMSGIVING, and UNITING OUR PRAYER TO THE CHURCH

• Jesus Christ established His Church and gave Her the authority TO BIND AND TO LOOSE

• We get to experience that treasury of grace that God gives us every time we approach the Throne of His Mercy in the Sacrament of Reconciliation

• Fr. Mike is praying FOR YOU!!

• Please pray for Fr. Mike and for each other!!

• I cannot WAIT to see you tomorrow!!