"Fr. John Echert, S.S.L.Father Echert is a priest of the Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis, ordained in 1987. He is a member of the faculty of The Saint Paul Seminary in Minnesota and teaches Sacred Scripture. He is also an adjunt faculty member of the University of St. Thomas. Father Echert has the Licentiate in Sacred Scripture (S.S.L.) degree from the Pontifical Biblical Institute, Rome with additional graduate studies at the Ecole Biblique, Jerusalem. He is also a military chaplain in the U.S. Air Force Reserve.
Father Echert writes a column on the monthly readings of the Mass for "The Catholic Servant," a monthly publication for Evangelization, Catechesis and Apologetics available on the internet at
www.catholicservant.org ."
https://www.ewtn.com/faith/QA/expertslist.htm
And of course he quotes the ECFs you so love the quote
from -
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12575a.htm
Purgatorial FIRE
.... In the
West the
belief in the
existence of real fire is common. Augustine (
Enarration on Psalm 37, no. 3) speaks of the pain which
purgatorial fire causes as more severe than anything a man can suffer in this life, "gravior erit ignis quam quidquid potest homo pati in hac vita" (P.L., col. 397).
Gregory the Great speaks of those who after this life "
will expiate their faults by purgatorial flames," and he adds "that the pain be
more intolerable than any one can suffer in this life" (Ps. 3 poenit., n. 1). Following in the footsteps of
Gregory,
St. Thomas teaches (IV, dist. xxi, q. i, a.1) that
besides the separation of the
soul from the
sight of God, there is the
other punishment from fire. "Una poena damni, in quantum scilicet retardantur a divina visione; alia sensus secundum quod ab igne punientur", and
St. Bonaventure not only agrees with
St. Thomas but adds (IV, dist. xx, p.1, a.1, q. ii) that
this punishment by fire is more severe than any punishment which comes to
men in this life; "Gravior est omni temporali poena. quam modo sustinet anima carni conjuncta". How this fire affects the
souls of the departed the Doctors do not
know, and in such matters it is well to heed the warning of the
Council of Trent when it commands the
bishops "to exclude from their preaching difficult and subtle questions which tend not to edification', and from the discussion of which there is no increase either in
piety or
devotion" (Sess. XXV, "De Purgatorio").
==================================
If you can prove I am using sources that are anti-Catholic or that are not-known to Catholics or that have been discredited by the RCC - please show the data.
I'm sure billions could agree with you Bob,
The only ones I know of that agree with those Catholic positions quoted above - are Catholics.
No doubt you have concluded logically and very well based on the information provided to you.
A reasonable conclusion
But, That's not how it works Ryan.
Case in point, MANY catholics thought and I'm sure some still think, that THE BIBLE, A Catholic Book is the Final Authority concerning matters of Faith. Fact some were so convinced they left to do their own thing.
Certainly the protesting trying-to-reform-the-RCC catholics thought that at one time until they found out that the Bible is the work of God - and not the RCC.
I myself remember debating a nun in grade school, I forgot the subject, she beat me on basis if it is not in the bible then it is not true. SO I thought to myself oh well its a rule book then?
And then you read it??
I bet if we could do a poll of all Catholics on earth a majority would assume Sola Scriptura is how it operates.
Certainly we can all hope that were true.
And would they get the "papal imprimatur" for such a conclusion???
This doesn't change Catholic teaching. If you want the teaching Officially I provided the link to Vatican catechism
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM
Catholic teaching gets promoted by Catholic teachers and they themselves need the papal Imprimatur for books that they write if they want cloistered closed-minded Catholics to read it.
We are doing a same game of sola scriptura over other catholic sources. We can play that game.
The exact meanings of everything you read in the very mysterious and cryptic, coded in catholic understanding, hard to understand EWTN, RC encyclopedia, and Baltimore Catechism can be found in Vatican catechism on the link I provided.
The easy-to-read clear-as-day statements that we find in places like EWTN, RC encyclopedia, and Baltimore Catechism -- do not magically turn into "hard-to-read" just because someone tries out a Jedi mind-trick on Baptist Board.
You already knew that right??
I have a CATHOLIC North Alaska-catechism right here in my hand says 100031 in purgatory everyone is going freeze their rear off.
And does it have the papal "imprimatur"???
Logical fallacy that obvious statements are too complicated to understand - is transparently flawed on the surface of it.
