5/22/2022

This past week school ended paving the way for summer schedule to start for our children and thus for us. We have had a good year and I am grateful to the faculty and staff, led by our Principal Karma Coleman, for all the hard work that has gone into making this a good year. The students seem to have come through the pandemic and returned to learning in good shape academically, or so the scores indicate.
I am planning on taking vacation from June 27 – July 14. I will also be on retreat with the KC-St. Joseph priests at Conception Abbey from June 20 (evening) – June 24 (morning).
The last in this series of questions is about indulgences. An indulgence is the remission of the temporal punishment due to sin which has already been forgiven. When we go to confession and receive absolution (forgiveness), our sins are forgiven, but not necessarily the temporal punishment due to the sins. An example would be if an alcoholic is forgiven for getting drunk, his/her sin is forgiven, but he/she may still want to drink more alcohol. The desire to sin remains. That indicates that there is more work to be done to find total healing. This is true especially with sins we have habits of committing (vices). They are like saplings which have taken root, and while we can cut off the top, they grow back unless dealt with at the root. In theological language, we say that the sin is forgiven, but the temporal punishment due to sin (the work to eradicate the sinful desires, to purify us and prepare us for being with God, and to correct what wrong was done) is not accomplished. This is what indulgences do. If you can remember my discussion of the deadly sins earlier this year, I mentioned corresponding virtues that could replace those sins. Indulgences help us in developing virtues and purifying us in preparation to meet Our Lord.
Indulgences also allow for purification to happen here on earth. Ideally, one could have all the temporal punishment/purification remitted here on earth before death. If not, then we can do it in “purgatory,” an antechamber of heaven in which we are purified. An indulgence that remits all punishment due to sin is called a plenary indulgence. It requires that one be sorry for all the sins one has committed, confess these sins, and receive Holy Communion in the state of grace within a couple of weeks. A partial indulgence remits part of the temporal punishment due to sin. An example of an indulgence is the penance one receives when one goes to confession. There are also indulgences associated with certain prayers like saying the Rosary. An indulgence may be applied to the living or to the dead. When we say the Rosary at someone’s wake, I normally add on an Our Father, a Hail Mary, and a Glory Be for the intention of the Holy Father which qualifies that Rosary for a plenary indulgence. There are a few common misunderstandings about indulgences. 1) The Church does not sell grace, and you should never pay for an indulgence. It was done in the past, it was an abuse, and it still is today. 2) An indulgence is NOT a way of saying that Christ’s suffering, death, and resurrection are not enough to wipe away sin. Rather, indulgences are more about our inability to handle all the grace available to us. We are not ready to be in the presence of Christ due to some venial sin or some attachment to this life, so we need God’s grace to transform us. 3) Indulgences do not forgive/remit sins, only the punishment due for sins. What the teaching on indulgences does say is that it is the Church which acts as the distributor of the graces by which temporal punishment is remitted (indulgences) as well as the forgiveness or retention of sins (Mt. 16:19 – the power to bind and loose). There is a “treasury” of grace of infinite depth which consists in what Christ did for us, what the saints did, and what the Church does. It is greater than any sin or evil, and has power of sin and death.

Father Albert, O.S.B.