My Catholicism is to assume all my dead family and friends in Purgatory will be there until I die. Did Our Lady of Fatima not tell one of the Children she would be in Purgatory for a very, very long time. If so, God help others sent there to clean their souls. We all pray for the souls in Purgatory at every Mass we go to. Think of it, billions of prayers that one would think would clean out Purgatory.
Now I do not know about private revelation, but I do know about reality. My friend, one of a family with priests and nuns who himself went into a seminary to be a priest in the 1960s. Four years later he came out. Believe it or not, such was the experience that he lost his faith completely. I was too young then to know about the going-ons in Maynooth Semenary or to understand the Modernism already in the Church.
A few years later he told me he woke up one night to find his dead brother standing at the foot of his bed. His brother told him God in His mercy had allowed him to return to his family to tell them they were not praying enough for him in Purgatory. My best friend then said the brother disappeared.
I remember reasoning, how come God allowed that man to return and not others. I reasoned that Catholic family of his had given two priests and two nuns to the service of God and for this He granted a special plea. My friend gathered the Family from near and far to tell them of their siblings appearance and request. From that moment on not a day went by without prayers for that brother in Purgatory.
Strangely this incidence did not reconvert my friend back to a strong faith.
I give my word that this is a true happening.
As I am at it I have one other life incident (in 72 years) of a preternatural nature to tell. Two other Catholic schoolfriends of 18 years old told me they were talking about selling their souls to the devil in a car on the way to the home of one of them. One was such that you could believe he would have if given a chance. That young man got out of the car holding the door-key as one does. The next minute he turned around and said the key was gone, must have dropped it in the car. They searched in vain, could not understand where it had gone. He got out of the car again and threw a pebble up to a bedroom window where his sister was sleeping. She opened the window to be asked to throw down her door key. The two boys continued to wonder on the mystery when there was a loud bang, like a dustbin-lid hitting the ground. They looked and saw a key on the ground, glowing like it was red-hot. The sister came to the window to be asked what was she up to. She said getting the key which she threw down to the brother. The boys picked up the banged key to find it was his key, no doubt about it, but bent now, unusable.
Needless to say the experience frightened them and the next day they went to a Holy-Ghost priest to try to get an explanation. The priest found out they were discussing the sale of a soul to the Devil. He told them never again to think that way or discuss it with seriousness. Again, as with my other friend, both these eventually lost the faith in spite of those two preternatural happenings.
It goes to show you Faith is something you must want before the Lord will give it to you or keep giving it to you.
Topic: Praying for the souls in purgatory not necessary (Read 54075 times)