By DON FIER
In concluding our examination of the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) on article 11 of the Creed, we saw that in order “to rise with Christ, we must die with Christ” (CCC, n. 1005). Death, with all the mystery which surrounds this common fate of all mankind, is the gateway to everlasting life.
Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ, expertly encapsulates all that death means for the Christian through the eyes of faith: It is the consequence of sin, a share in Christ’s death on Calvary, the end of our probation on Earth, God’s calling us to Himself, a precious sacrifice we can make to God, and the beginning of eternal life (cf. The Faith, p. 98).
“Depending on how we view what happens at bodily death and what we expect after we die,” teaches Fr. Hardon, “everything else follows” (The Catholic Catechism [TCC], p. 254). For those unbelievers who live according to the well-known advertising tagline, “You only go around once in life so you’ve got to grab for all the gusto you can,” bodily death is speciously presumed to be the end — it seems to finish what our senses call real. Others falsely believe this life is but one phase in an endless cycle of reincarnations.
But as Christians, we firmly believe — as taught by the Church — that “God has revealed very clearly that we do not die at death but merely change, and our earthly habitation is to be exchanged for a heavenly one” (ibid.). For those who have faith, the counsel of the Old Testament Prophet Sirach will influence all their earthly strivings: “In all you do, remember the end of your [corporeal] life, and then you will never sin” (Sirach 7:36).
This brings us to article 12 of the Apostle’s Creed: “I believe in . . . life everlasting,” which we correspondingly profess in slightly different words in the Nicene Creed: “I look forward to . . . the life of the world to come.” The Catechism introduces this final article of the Creed with the following words: “The Christian who unites his own death to that of Jesus views it as a step towards him and an entrance into everlasting life” (CCC, n. 1020). The immediate first step as we depart life as we know it on Earth will be the topic of consideration for the remainder of this column: the particular judgment.
What happens at the moment of death? As Christians, we believe that when the soul separates from the body, it marks “an end to human life as the time open to either accepting or rejecting the divine grace manifested in Christ” (CCC, n. 1021). In other words, the opportunity for merit and repentance ends at death and the eternal destiny of each human person is sealed. Man’s separated soul instantaneously appears before God and judgment is rendered “in accordance with his works and faith” (ibid.).
Three outcomes are possible at one’s particular judgment: immediate entrance into the blessedness of Heaven, entrance into the blessedness of Heaven through a purification, or immediate and eternal damnation (cf. CCC, n. 1022).
According to the brilliant Dominican theologian Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, who guided the doctoral work of St. John Paul II on faith in the works of St. John of the Cross: “The existence of the particular judgment, affirmed by the ordinary teaching of the Church, is founded on Scripture and tradition [and] theological reasoning confirms this truth” (Life Everlasting: A Theological Treatise on the Four Last Things [FLT], p. 73).
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange goes on to cite the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas that it would be contrary to the wisdom, mercy, and justice of God for a departed soul to remain in uncertainty about his ultimate destination until the final judgment at the end of time (Summa Theologiae III, Q. 59, art. 4, ad 1; art. 5).
Let us now briefly examine Sacred Scripture for evidence that particular judgment follows death. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, “There is no text of which we can certainly say that it expressly affirms this dogma but there are several which teach an immediate retribution after death and thereby clearly imply a particular judgment.”
Looking first to the Old Testament, Fr. Hardon points to the Book of Sirach as a prophetic warning of the importance of the account to be given at the moment of death (cf. TCC, p. 255). “It is easy in the sight of the Lord to reward a man on the day of death according to his conduct. The misery of an hour makes one forget luxury, and at the close of a man’s life his deeds will be revealed” (Sirach 11:26-27).
In the New Testament, one of the most clear revelations concerning judgment at the moment of death is given in the Letter to the Hebrews: “It is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment” (Heb. 9:27). Likewise, as discussed in earlier columns (see volume 147, nn. 7 and 13; February 13 and March 27, 2014), the Gospel of St. Luke provides implicit evidence of reward and retribution prior to the general judgment in the parable about Lazarus and Dives (see Luke 16:19-31) and in the account of the repentant thief on Calvary (see Luke 23:40-43).
Likewise, the verse telling of Judas’ fate “to go to his own place” (Acts 1:25) following his unrepented betrayal of Jesus, taken along with a verse that appears in two of the Synoptic Gospels: “It would have been better for that man if he had not been born” (Mark 14:21; Matt. 26:24), seem to indicate that judgment and retribution immediately followed his death.
The Church did not officially define her dogma on the particular judgment until the Middle Ages. Early Christians believed that the wicked were condemned to Hell immediately after death; however, clarification of doctrine concerning the fate of the just developed more slowly. As related by Fr. Hardon, Pope John XXII (1249-1334), one of the Avignon Popes (he canonized St. Thomas Aquinas), preached a sermon on All Saints Day in 1331 in which he said “the souls of the blessed do not enjoy the full sight of God until after the general judgment” (TCC, p. 256).
His teaching was denounced by many, and after initially defending himself, John XXII called an assembly of cardinals and theologians, who convinced him that he was mistaken. “Soon after, on his deathbed, he publicly retracted the theory of ‘suspended judgment,’ while explaining that he had spoken not as head of the Church [ex cathedra] but simply as a private person” (ibid.).
His immediate Successor, Pope Benedict XII (d. 1342), clarified official Church teaching by issuing the constitution Benedictus Deus (“On the Beatific Vision of God”) on January 29, 1336. In it, he solemnly pronounced: “We, with our apostolic authority, define the following,” and proceeded to declare that the just, who die in God’s friendship, “immediately after death and, in the case for those in need of purification, after the purification…have been, are, and will be with Christ in heaven” (Denzinger, Enchiridion Symbolorum, n. 1000).
“Moreover,” he continues, “we define that . . . . the souls of those who die in actual mortal sin go down into hell immediately after death and there suffer the pain of hell” (ibid., n. 1002).
Instantaneous Judgment
Following the thought of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, let us now examine the nature of particular judgment. In criminal and civil trials to which we are accustomed, three steps normally occur: the evidence is examined, the verdict and sentence is pronounced, and the sentence is executed. Although one might identify similarities in steps employed in the human justice system and in God’s divine judgment, the differences are marked and unmistakable.
First, the examination of evidence in divine judgment “is instantaneous, because it needs neither the testimony of witnesses, for or against, nor the least discussion” (FLT, p. 73). God, who is omniscient, sees the state of one’s soul without possibility of error. He sees not only all deeds — good and evil, done and undone — but all desires, thoughts, and motives. Absolutely nothing is hidden from His penetrating gaze.
Second, the pronouncement of verdict and sentence is likewise immediate. It occurs in an entirely spiritual manner: “Intellectual illumination awakes all acquired ideas, gives additional infused ideas, whereby the soul sees its entire past in a glance. The soul sees how God judges, and conscience makes this judgment definitive” (ibid., p. 74).
Third, effecting of sentence is also instantaneous for there is nothing to retard execution for an omnipotent God: “Separated souls go without delay, either to the recompense [or to a temporary state of purification] due to their merit . . . or to the eternal punishment due to their demerits” (ibid.). Thus, at the exact instant when body and soul separate in bodily death, all steps associated with particular judgment take place instantaneously.
Next week, we will look at the everlasting joy that is in store for those who enter into Heaven.
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(Don Fier serves on the board of directors for The Catholic Servant, a Minneapolis-based monthly publication. He and his wife are the parents of seven children. Fier is a 2009 graduate of Ave Maria University’s Institute for Pastoral Theology. He is doing research for writing a definitive biography of Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ.)
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