For the pious catholic?  a few days?

For the lapsed catholic who luckily had last rites?  10,000 years?

What do you folks think?

Well, time doesn't enter into the equation in the sense we know it this side of the Great Beyond. So, the matter centers on both whatever guilt remains for unabsolved and/or unrepented venial sins and the balance due on the unpaid debt of sin unique to each individual soul.

The degree of perfection of individual contrition, absolute sorrow for all sins, willing submission to the pains, penalties and sorrows of one's death, the obtainment  of indulgences, the intercessions of the Saints and good souls still in this life, Masses, fasting and penances offered for particular souls, etc. may also affect the sentence - IF God so permits.

He is not obligated in strict Justice to do so, of course. Nevertheless, the degree of charity achieved and exercised by the deceased and those interceding for his swift delivery from the torments of Purgatory, can obtain, God permitting, relief.

Romano Amerio has a solid section on the long-overlooked reality of the very matter of salvation and its absolute dependence on the state of one's soul AT THE PRECISE MOMENT OF DEATH. From that, obviously, flow all consequences of sins committed prior to that instant. Amerio points out that the image of a balance in which good and bad deeds are weighed throughout the life of one's soul is entirely UNCATHOLIC.

Our Lady informed Lucia at Fatima that a teenage friend would be in Purgatory until the end of time. Many, many Masses were offered for her and yet there was never any indication after the announcement from Heaven of that sentence that it was ever ameliorated or reduced or cancelled.

As well, I've read, and I wish I could recall if it was a Saint or a spiritual writer of some note, that the usual sentence in Purgatory for Carmelite nuns is forty years.

Considering St. Thomas' teaching that the agonies of Purgatory are so much more intense than all the sufferings imaginable in this life, and the very great likelihood that almost everyone not sent to Hell will spend a very, very long time there, compared to a Carmelite nun who spent 40, 50, perhaps 60 or more years living a consecrated life of strict obedience, silence, prayer, penance, abstinence and intense fasting, what we decide to do about that stark, irreversible and absolutely inevitable reality does take on a much greater significance than almost anyone can imagine.

A superb resource, Shin.

Many thanks - and your monitum regarding idle speech is most commendable.

St Marie Alaquoque said that there were two women of rank that died. One spent as many days in Purgatory as she had lived while the other spent as many years as she had lived in Purgatory. The reason that the former left so early was that during life she was in the habit of forgivng all the minor wrongs and inconveniences that she would suffer during her life here on earth.

For the pious catholic?  a few days?

For the lapsed catholic who luckily had last rites?  10,000 years?

What do you folks think?

As long as it needs to last.

Tan has a book for about $16. explanation of purgatory.  I've read it.  Some go to purgatory and God gives them the grace to remind their loved ones that they did such and such and need masses, indulgences.  Some say a norm or 40 -60 years, our Lady spoke to Lucia of one of her friends if they got to heaven and Our Lady replied that this young lady friend would be in purgatory til the end of the world?  I do believe that is what she said, you can look it up.  There is no time, is true, for those in purgatory who do come to remind their loved ones for prayers, think that they have been in purgatory a very long period like a year, and yet the body is not buried yet.  Good reading.

An excellent, excellent point Claudel - as usual!

Yes, the plenary indulgence, and I would think by whichever means available ( there are a number of prayers, practices, blessings, etc. which can provide it ), has a critical role to play for those truly in the state of grace who die with perfect resignation and in perfect charity, directed to God as their sole end.

"Whatsoever thou loosest on earth..." still packs a huge spiritual wallop.

I think my key point in making those remarks, earlier, was to work out in my own mind the interrelation of perfect contrition, strict justice, indulgences, etc. in the lax (and depraved) environment in which we find ourselves now.

Ultimately, the penitent himself in the particular judgment will realize with the totality of his soul that it is NOT God's will for any soul to undergo Purgatory.

The penitent, in that awful instant, will know where he is to go and will do so willingly in a state of "supra-comprehensible" reality.

He will recognize the infinite charity, beauty, purity and wisdom of God while he beholds, within, the devastation, shame and guilt that still stains his own soul as it stands before Divine Justice.

St. Teresa of Avila wrote to her nuns that they should never over-concern themselves with Purgatory inasmuch as it mattered as nothing compared to what everyone, including the "best", actually deserves in strict justice.

Matto, yes, purgation lasts until the General Judgment. And I think it quite possible that what you described IS the case for a very great percentage of souls. So, you know considerably more than you realize.

Every soul in Purgatory can benefit from all the traditional means the Church affords them by way of supplication.

And, in the literature, indications are that some fortunate souls have been pardoned from serving their full term through Masses, indulgences, prayers, etc.

However, in this age of apostasy, progressivism and indifference, the number of Catholics doing even a little bit now and again to aid the suffering souls may be very, very small.