23 - Grandpa's up in heaven

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Aug 3, 2024

It's a common sentiment. Grandpa's up there looking down on us. But how do you know? You can hope certainly, but to say it with such confidence is disrespectful to the faith and specifically to the notion of God's Judgement exacting the last mite.

The way to heaven is narrow and those that enter are few. But we don't like to think about that. The Jehovah's witness have an interesting way of denying the terrifying reality of hell. They say all the obvious talk of the hell of fire in Scripture is merely a metaphor for complete destruction i.e. you cease to exist. That's one way to cope. We on the other hand cope by stretching the mercy of God beyond what mercy can do. We say nothing is a mortal sin, or if it was God forgave so-and-so out of a particular grace merited by perfect charity. Well really we're less theological. We say God loves us, he wouldn't send us to hell. Would you send your kids to hell if you were God?

This is gravely presumptious. Remember the words of Christ "If God were your father you would indeed love me.... You are of your father the devil"

The Church teaches that anyone who dies in a state of mortal sin or is unbaptized can never enter the kingdom of heaven. And there is only one other option. You profess this when you say the creed. "I profess one baptism for the forgiveness of sins". It stands hell is real and you will go there unless your sins are forgiven.

Now consider these words of Scripture "If thy brother sin against thee, reprove him: and if he do penance, forgive him. And if he sin against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day be converted unto thee, saying, I repent; forgive him." and also "Forgive us as we forgive those who trespass against us"

Now if Christ commands us to forgive those who repent and to ask God to forgive as we forgive, it follows that God only forgives those who repent. And how could he forgive any more? Because without repentence the crime continues in your soul. And mercy can only pray "Forgive them for they know not what they do", as in give them the grace to repent for they would repent if they knew.

But we can think of it from a different angle too. Heaven is a place of perfection. Beyond anything you could ever imagine. Now consider the people in your life. If you were to have communion with them in heaven as we believe in the communion of Saints, would it be immaculate. Is there no flaw in any of these people? Would there still be even occasional bickering, sharp words. If all these people and all the grandparents of all these people would be in your mind one big perfectly happy family in heaven, you're delusional. But the alternative means only two things. They go to hell, or they go to purgatory.

Therefore, pray for the deceased you love

Do not canonize them to heaven in your mind and leave them to burn in purgatory where they can cry out but their own prayers avail them little to nothing and you, you could say one little Hail Mary and give them relief. But you ignore them and pray for more worldly wealth to help damn yourself with.

As a child growing up in the church, you learn by watching others. And as an adult, you realize the less you watch others the better, and you keep your eyes down. But in that time as a child, I very, very rarely saw anyone not go to communion who went to mass. Heck I've seen Anglicans go to communion in Catholic churches. And you know you want to say maybe everybody's on top of it: keeping the fast, diligently preparing themselves, confessing their sins. But I've been in the confession line long enough to recognize the handful of people who go. It confounds me how priests never mention it. I had a priest say in the homily once how he worked like 40 hours a week just like the rest of us, and so he has confessions like saturday nights and wednesday and maybe if you can catch him after a daily mass or something. But Father, there's a big difference between your 40 a week and ours. We don't come home after work and ignore our children. And on top of that you have to answer for the souls of thousands. Every man, woman and child within your parish. And that includes the non-catholics residing there.

That's why Jean Vianney spent countless hours in the confessional, why he passed the night in prayer with only 2-3 hours of sleep. Our priests have an extremely high burden. And their time would be spent better doing what only a priest can do - preaching, administering the sacraments, absolving peoples sins. Especially hearing confessions before mass on Sunday, because for a great many catholics especially Children, Sundays are the only days they can make it to church, and to say well, "no confessions sunday" is to say, "no worthy communions for you"

And that's the thing. People take recieving communion so very lightly. The king of heaven is coming to you and you showed up dressed either like a whore or a couch potato. You fasted the bare minimum hour but it wasn't really a fast because you wouldn't eat normally that hour. You showed up 5 minutes early and left nearly before the dismissal. Not collecting yourself with prayer. Maybe even using the kids as an excuse - "well they don't behave well if..." Well who's job is it to teach them to behave well. You deprive them of the most essential thing you could give them as a parent - a knowledge and love of God.

So go to communion if you have prepared yourself, are in a state of grace, desire to recieve him. Then it is a good thing. Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you will not have life within you. But if you go out of habit, unexamined, lukewarm, without having confessed, you eat and drink judgment unto yourself. And you will be guily of the body and blood of the Lord.

In 1970, women started having kids on average at 21 y.o. Today they average 27. We know why. Old people told everyone to wait to have a family which just means make sure you use birth control, er... protection. Gotta protect yourself from babies. Yep... and you think people don't go to hell.