They're 82 and 81

My parents, that is.

I just got off the phone with my parents. We discussed their living will. Well, I will "let them go" if there is a flat-line where a brain wave should be. But not unless and until.

My mom was a seventh grade teacher. Do you recall that "Look" that a teacher can give that lets you know you're in BIG trouble? My mom can do that look quite well. She practiced the "Look" for quite a number of years as a teacher. But I'm not worried. I live down South, they live in a Mid-Atlantic State. And neither of us has a camera set up on the computer. Yet. I better not give her any ideas. Mom says that if she is competent enough to give me that "Look" when she's "down for the count" it means "Let me go." We'll see. I prefer for her to just go to sleep one night and forget to wake up this side of heaven (I say that for her, I really mean purgatory, but don't tell her that's what I mean).

I think that the way Pope John Paul the Great died was so moving. He just said "Amen" and died. Wow. What a perfectly fantastic way to die. "Amen." "So be it." And he wasn't starved or dehydrated to death, either. He knew his time had come and that his body was shutting down. He was in a lot of pain. You can see it in his eyes and face when you look at the photos of his last few weeks among us. But he wasn't yet finished with his paperwork and kept that up until the day he died. What fortitude. "Hold on a minute, Lord, I have to sign these papers here and I'll be right with you." I doubt that was the conversation. I imagine it was more like "John Paul II, there are a few more papers for you to sign and then we'll leave for purgatory and heaven."

Okay, Mom's saying "Purgatory?" Well, yes. From New Advent dot org: "The whole penitential system of the Church testifies that the voluntary assumption of penitential works has always been part of true repentance and the Council of Trent (Sess. XIV, can. xi) reminds the faithful that God does not always remit the whole punishment due to sin together with the guilt. God requires satisfaction, and will punish sin, and this doctrine involves as its necessary consequence a belief that the sinner failing to do penance in this life may be punished in another world, and so not be cast off eternally from God."

And more, Mom: "There are several passages in the New Testament that point to a process of purification after death. Thus, Jesus Christ declares (Matthew 12:32): "And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in the world to come." According to St. Isidore of Seville (Deord. creatur., c. xiv, n. 6) these words prove that in the next life "some sins wil be forgiven and purged away by a certain purifying fire." St. Augustine also argues "that some sinners are not forgiven either in this world or in the next would not be truly said unless there were other [sinners] who, though not forgiven in this world, are forgiven in the world to come" (De Civ. Dei, XXI, xxiv). The same interpretation is given by Gregory the Great (Dial., IV, xxxix); St. Bede (commentary on this text); St. Bernard (Sermo lxvi in Cantic., n. 11) and other eminent theological writers.

A further argument is supplied by St. Paul in I Cor., iii, 11-1,5: "For other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid; which is Christ Jesus. Now if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay stubble: Every man's work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work burn, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire." While this passage presents considerable difficulty, it is regarded by many of the Fathers and theologians as evidence for the existence of an intermediate state in which the dross of lighter transgressions will be burnt away, and the soul thus purified will be saved. This, according to Bellarmine (De Purg., I, 5), is the interpretation commonly given by the Fathers and theologians; and he cites to this eftect:

St. Ambrose (commentary on the text, and Sermo xx in Ps. cxvii),
St. Jerome, (Comm. in Amos, c. iv),
St. Augustine (Comm. in Ps. xxxvii),
St. Gregory (Dial., IV, xxxix), and
Origen (Hom. vi in Exod.).
See also St. Thomas, "Contra Gentes,", IV, 91. For a discussion of the exegetical problem, see Atzberger, "Die christliche Eschatologie", p. 275."

You don't have to believe me, but the website is http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12575a.htm

I was Assembly of God for over 17 years. If they can take a LATIN word, from the Vulgate, even, the Catholic Bible, and create an entire belief system of a "rapture" of the church and have hundreds of thousands of people believe that, which you have to agree is a stretch, but not accept written scripture as cited above, I question how they can believe the one and not the other.

But I'm not here to argue religion. My Church has been around since the Upper Room and is based on the heritage, faith and religion of the Jews, which has been around for a lot longer than that. (PS to my cousins: John the Baptizer did NOT institute the Baptist Church.)

Ready for comments. Mom? It won't hurt my feelings if you comment. I know you think you're always right, but on this, you're partly right.

OH, I found a great website to read the Douay-Rheims Bible. Fascinating. http://www.drbo.org/ Check it out. Read the Intro and the Prefaces. VERY educational.