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I had combed through a few articles that talked about it. And I went back to look at a wiki article on CCR. I just don't think I have enough of an understanding of it to make heads or tails.

Catholic doctrine gives directions on many things, there is still a wide room for varying personal beliefs within that.

It looks like the general feeling from the Church is that some kinds and depths of charismatics is OK, but that there is a limit where it starts getting into bad territory.

The Catholic perspective is that gifts continue, but that we shouldn't necessarily be expecting enormous abundance of these kinds of signs.

This is me just gleaming the data. I don't have any first hand experience seeing any Catholic charismatics.

The concept of attempting to channel speaking in tongues isn't my cup of tea. To me a gift would flow naturally and not be something you could essentially "summon up" as a personal power. If I saw a group of individuals attempt "tongues" my first thought would not likely be an acceptance that they were genuinely speaking a coherent language. That said, because I believe in the continuation of miracles into present day, I could see something like this happening in some case.

I'm willing to contemplate the topic more, I just don't have enough information on it at the moment to give any meaningful input on it beyond broad strokes.

I'm the kind of guy that will listen to 4h lectures in my leisure to get more information. If you have anything on the topic, I'd gladly give it a listen.


If the Catholic faith had said something along the lines of "purgatory is an independent phenomenon from God and heals people without God", I never would have become Catholic.

There are a lot of images in the Bible about God being a consuming fire, that God will purify you like metal worked on by flame, and that every man's works will be tried by fire and that the unworthy self creations will be burned away. I can hunt down the verses, but if you know what I'm talking about, you'll see where I'm coming from. The Bible points at the concept that God does the purifying.

But, we sometimes see cases where God performs a good work (such as a miracle) through the hands of someone (like Paul). It follows that God could perform the act of purification/sanctification through any kind of created medium. That could include a place dedicated to purification such as the concept of purgatory. Purification/sanctification and regeneration are a process. It starts in life, and then it would continue after death.

Many Protestant perspectives hold that it would be something instantaneous at the time of death. Other Protestant perspectives hold that it is instantaneous after a soul-sleep. And the third perspective is that it is a gradual process after death.

There are different interpretations of what purgatory actually is. Just like the "fire" of hell may be a metaphor for great pain and not a literal fire, so too purgatory may be something more abstract that the depictions something like Dante's divine comedy.

The Catholic Catechism talks about purification and cleansing by fire but doesn't go into details from what I can see (CCC 1030-1032). If that is the case, it follows that purgatory might be something like walking through your entire life with God moment by moment and having a long conversation about everything that happened. Having any question you ever had answered. That process could take hundreds of years. Not for the sake of judgement (as anyone entering purgatory is already saved by grace), but for the sake of resolving any unresolved angst and pain that was in life. The nature of it would be unpleasant but by the end of it you would be purified and at peace. To the best of my understanding that stands as a valid interpretation of purgatory within Catholicism.


When we see our children doing chores, we tend to be happy not for the quality of their work but their eagerness to try to help within the context of their capacity. The same concept applies to good works. It's not that the quality of our works is any more than filthy rags, but if there is a willingness to let God work through us, that speaks to the state of our faith. Works are essentially just the fruits of faith in motion.

The book of James calls faith without works a dead faith. It's a legitimate question to anyone that says faith without works can save. Can dead faith save? If yes, why does James call it dead faith? What exactly was he getting at with his words?

I appreciate the discussion! Looking forward to your next reply. God bless

It's not possible to stop being Jewish.
Saul was a Jew up until the point that his DNA disentegrated.
And even then, when he got into heaven, he still stunk like a Jew.

You checked his work?
Or you just believe it because a Jew told you to believe it?