Purgatory Revisted

Fr. Ron Rolheiser has written about his understanding of Purgatory a few times, and he revisits the topic here. He rightly describes Purgatory as a process of grace, and basically describes it as the painful experience of being in Heaven while still having the draw of our earthly attachment and Heaven, by its nature, having the purgative effect of grace, enabling the dead to truly enter it. He suggests an interesting point that our prayer for the dead should reflect their embracing of Heaven and our desire to see them there:

Purgatory is the pain of letting go of this life in order to live in the next. That's not an abstract concept... More immediately after their deaths, [the dead] still want and need our former contact. Slowly, though, as time passes, our prayers must more and more invite the ascension and must work at freeing both them and us from how we once had each other ("Do not cling! Let the old ascend!").

Eventually our prayers must give our loved ones permission to be free from how things used to be with us and the world, so that they can enter fully into that final ecstasy of love which, though dimly glimpsed in faith, is beyond our imaginings and which we too will one day enter, though only after having --- through purgative pain --- ourselves let go of the marvels of earthly, natural life, with all its wonderful tangible solidity.

This is an interesting concept. So often, when I pray for my loved ones who have died, or when I ask the saints to pray for me, I have trouble relating to them beyond mere human, mere earthly ways. If the saints are in heaven, and their relationship with God is perfect, then our relationship with them is also transformed beyond what we would have experienced on earth. My prayer should reflect this - instead of holding them down to me (how I once knew them), I should let the holiness and grace of Christ they now manifest humble me and draw me toward Heaven (how I am to know them now).