Ongkingco
Father! Father! I’m so scared of purgastory!” Rudy, a grade 3 pupil preparing for his first Confession and Holy Communion, said.
“Afraid of Purga-story?” I was so amused with how he said the word.
“’Coz the man who chose three days in purgastory instead of cancer for three years felt that thirty minutes was like many years already!” he exclaimed.
“Why would that be scary, Rudy?”
“I don’t want to stay there sooo long, Father!”
“But you don’t have to if you begin your purga-story here.”
“How?”
“By embracing the little pinpricks of every day, and offering it up to God, the souls in purgatory and for yourself.”
“Pinpricks?”
“Yeah! Like what I said in class: the heat, eating more veggies, cleaning up your room and fixing your own bed.”
“Oh, those!” he eagerly agreed.
* * *
Rudy’s fear of purgatory isn’t common. People often look to purgatory with hope, especially when it becomes like their last spiritual resort of salvation.
Although purgatory already assures one of going to heaven, our faith teaches that its physical and spiritual torments exist to purify the soul and repair the damages resulting from one’s sins: our so-called temporal punishment.
This is the reason why proactive souls already take advantage of earthly trials. They, so to speak, strive to pay forward for the consequences of their sins, aiming to skip purgatory and go straight to heaven.
Perhaps, a recent share I got can enlighten us on how the unexpected difficulties in life can actually spare us greater troubles and even our lives.
* * *
After the 9/11 attack, one company invited the remaining members of other companies who had been decimated by the attack to share their available office space.
At a morning meeting, the head of security told stories of why these people were alive. All the stories were just the “little” things:
• The head of the company survived that day because his son started kindergarten.
• Another fellow was alive because it was his turn to bring donuts.
• One woman was late because her alarm clock didn’t go off in time.
• One of them missed his bus.
• One spilled food on her clothes and had to take time to change.
• One’s car wouldn’t start.
• One went back to answer the telephone.
• One had a child who dawdled and didn’t get ready as soon as he should have.
• One couldn’t get a taxi.
• A man who put on a new pair of shoes that morning took the various means to get to work, but before he got there, he developed a blister on his foot. He stopped by a drugstore to buy a Band-Aid.
Coincidence or not, fake news or not, we have all experienced that certain delays or troubles can actually become blessings! If such earthly gains are achieved from little sacrifices or inconveniences, how much more if we apply them for a celestial goal?
This invites us to have Christian ascetical program of constantly offering up — actively and passively — little sacrifices and trials (e.g., traffic, losing or forgetting things, missing out on some comfort, etc.). These become our daily purga-story, said through actions and not words, that purifies us and paves our way for heaven.