Q. Indulgences—what are they?
A. All Souls Day is approaching (Nov. 2), a fitting time to revisit the question of indulgences as one can gain them for the Poor Souls in Purgatory.
Indulgence is a topic, like Purgatory, that non-Catholics often reject as non-biblical (while some at the same time make use of non-biblical terms like Sola Scriptura, rapture, and “I accept Jesus as my personal Lord and Savior”). While true that the very word indulgence does not appear in Scripture, the term has found use in the Church for a reality that is quite biblical. Such developments can authentically take place in the Church because of the Analogy of Faith, the interconnection between all mysteries of faith, allowing for new connections to be discovered by the Church, led by the Spirit, as she engages new pastoral experiences throughout her history.
The term is related to justice, especially in how a judge imposes a sentence. A judge with indulgence will grant a favorable penalty (often when detecting an authentic desire to convert in the criminal), whereas a stringent judge will impose the maximum penalty (often to teach a lesson to a hardened criminal). And so, for the Catechism, indulgence is a remission before God – God being the ultimate cause and judge in all cases of indulgence. It is a remission (and therefore favorable juridical decision) concerning the temporal punishment whose guilt has already been forgiven.
Nothing can change an unrepentant sinner’s decision to persist apart from God. But for those who have been forgiven of the eternal pains of sin, there still exists some temporal pain in their souls due to sin’s effects. Sin breaks a bone in the soul. The bone can be reset, so that the patient is saved, but there is still some healing necessary to restore them to full health. This temporal penalty of sin is removed through purgation (for only the pure of heart shall see God, cf. Mt 5:8, Rev 21:27).
This is the basis for our belief in purgatory, the final purgation before entering the Kingdom for those repentant sinners who, upon death, have not yet been fully purified of their attachment to sin. Indulgence is gained by the faithful Christian. “The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful” (Jas 5:16), and so Scripture is full of examples of God’s willingness to limit punishment through the prayers of the righteous: Abraham intercedes for Sodom, Moses for Israel, David for his descendants, and others.
This Christian must be duly disposed under certain prescribed conditions, usually by going to confession and receiving Communion and so being made one with Christ, the righteous one, through whom comes all righteousness. It also takes place through the action of the Church which, as the minister of redemption, and thus, prayers for the Holy Father as visible head of the Church on earth is warranted to express that communion.
The Church is the body of Christ and thus God’s instrument of mercy on earth, so it is fitting that indulgence should also take place through this instrument. “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it” (1 Cor 12:26). By union with the Body of Christ, those souls in purgatory can benefit from the workings of the Church as that Body. The Church, through indulgences, dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints.
As St. Paul says, “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church” Col 1:24. Not that the lacking is something imperfect in Christ, but the afflictions of Christ still lacking in us. Until the full measure of Christ’s sufferings are applied to us, we have not yet filled up what is lacking. Sin is like an addiction, and that attachment to this addiction needs purified. As it has been shown with physical addictions, one of the best ways to break such an attachment is not through willpower but through authentic communion with others, so do indulgences express the addiction-breaking power of spiritual communion.
This question was answered by Father Joseph Wahlmeier, pastor of St. Mary Parish in Davey and instructor at St. Gregory the Great Seminary in Seward.
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