ANSWER by Staff on November 22, 2003

Dear Yvonne: That old saying is absolutely true. We do owe a debt that we cannot pay that comes from our sin. Jesus paid that debt on the Cross and thus redeemed mankind and opened the door for our personal debts to be paid by Him when we are baptized and when we ask forgiveness for our sins. This, however, has nothing to do with purgatory. Purgatory is NOT a place that we pay a debt for sin. The sin has been laid at the Cross of Calvary. Purgatory is where we work out the "consequences" of our sin that have not been paid during our life-time. I usually used this analogy of the Broken Windows: If I throw a rock through your window in anger, I have committed a sin. I may ask you to forgive me and you do; I may ask God to forgive me and He does. Thus, the sin is paid by Jesus on the Cross because I have repented and asked for forgiveness. Jesus paid the WHOLE penalty for that sin. Nothing of that sin is imputed to me; Jesus took it all. But.... ... although my sin has been forgiven and paid for by Jesus, the window is still broken. The broken window is the RESULT of my sin, the consequence of my sin. Although the sin itself has been forgiven, the consequence (the broken window) still remains. Since I broke the window it is my responsibility to fix the window -- to offer reparations. Purgatory is a place in which I must fix all the broken windows in my life that I did not get fixed during my earthly life. Thos in purgatory are all saved. Their sins have been paid for by Christ on the Cross; but the consequences of their sins, the broken windows, must be all fixed before they enter heaven. We must be more than "saved" to enter heaven, we must also be pure. We cannot be pure with broken windows on our account. The account must be cleared first. This is the meaning of 1 Cor. 3:15: (RSV) "If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire." God Bless, Bro. Ignatius Mary