In The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, senior tempter, Screwtape, refers to humans as amphibians-half spirit and half animal. As spirits we belong to the eternal world, the supernatural world, but as animals we inhabit time. This means that while our spirits can be directed to an eternal object, our bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time means to change.
Heaven is eternal or outside of time. If time is the measurement of continual change, and there is not time in heaven, there is no change in heaven. Those in heaven do not change. God is perfect, sacrificial love. Nothing imperfect can exist in the direct presence of God. For a person to be in the direct presence of God he must be perfect as God is perfect.
When God created the angels, he made them perfect, with full knowledge of who he is. They were given free will to worship and serve God or to serve themselves. Because angels can enter heaven and stand before God in timelessness, they have to be in a state of non-change. Once an angel makes their choice it is binding on them for all eternity. This is why angels who were cast out of heaven can never receive salvation and redemption. They are cursed to hell forever.
None of us achieve perfection in this life. We are given this life to work on our perfection, that is, we were given this life to learn to love the way God loves. When we die, we still have work to do. Non-Catholic Christians believe that when we die God takes us where we are at and automatically brings us to the fulfilment of perfection. Perfected, this person is now able to enter into the presence of God in heaven.
The problem with this idea is that it nullifies free will. God respects our free will above all else for not to do so would violate his very nature. God is total, sacrificial love. Love can never be forced. For love to exist there must be a choice. Free will exists so that we can choose to love or reject God. No free will, no ability to love God in return.
This creates a dilemma with the non-Catholic Christian understanding of what happens at our deaths. When we die, we cannot stay here. If God cannot automatically bring us to the fulfillment of perfection, we are unable to behold him in heaven. If we cannot stay here and we cannot enter heaven, where do we go?
The Jews believe in a place called Sheol, or the shadow world known as the Shades. Sheol is a place of stillness and darkness. If you lived a righteous life you would go to the part of Sheol known as the Bosom of Abraham. If you lived an immoral life your soul was consigned to the abyss, or the pit of hell reserved for the devil and his demons.
The Catholic belief of purgatory is similar to Sheol. Purgatory is a place of purgation where we learn to let go of our attachments to this life. This is a place where our love is perfected until only sacrificial love remains. Purgatory is more of a state of being than a physical place. When we die our souls are separated from our bodies and it is our souls that enter into purgatory. Because there is still change there is still time but time is experienced differently. In purgatory we are transitioning from time into timelessness.
Imagine being in a completely dark room with no light. Your eyes become a custom to the dark. Then imagine that you are sudden cast into the brightest light you have ever seen. The light would be so painful to your eyes that you would clench them tightly shut. You would be in agony until your eyes had the time to adjust to the light.
Going from this world into the presence of God is much like that. We are going from the darkness of this world into light itself. God’s light is so bright that we are blinded by it no matter how tightly we try to clutch our eyes shut. Purgatory is a place that allows us to come slowly into the light, only as fast as our eyes can adjust to it.
Purgatory is a very beautiful teaching of the Church. God allows us to continue to grow closer to him even after our time here is complete. It would be so much easier if God could just snap his fingers and make us perfect like him so we can be with him in heaven without having to do a thing ourselves. But if he could do that there would be no purpose for this life. If I have to be perfect to enter heaven, and God cannot just automatically make me perfect when I die, purgatory becomes a very necessary place.
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