what about the thief on the cross/ no purgatory?

some answers found on a facebook site :

1.I would guess that his implicit desire for baptism was all that was necessary for his slate to be wiped clean. Purgatory is only a consideration when we commit sins after our baptism.

2.Also, "faith alone" types try to use the good thief as an example of how a person only needs faith apart from works to be saved. However, clearly the good thief did both demonstrate faith and perform good works - he rebuked a sinner, educated the ignorant, publicly defended Christ, publicly admitted his guilt and implicitly demonstrated true contrition.

To perform all these works I would guess he had a baptism of desire (or blood) at that moment and was open to grace. His suffering on the cross would atone for any sins and I would guess that such a painful death and sincere contrition would mean he went straight to heaven

3.Short answer, we don't know. Perhaps his suffering combined with his faith sufficed, perhaps Christ granted him a special privilege of grace, perhaps all purgation takes mere moments in our earthly time? We don't know. The point of the story is his faith in Christ, even as a sinner, and Christ's complete grace

4.time is only really a term used in accomodation to us when we think of the places of eternity (which are timeless) like heaven, hell and purgatory. So "tonight" would be Jesus' way of saying "soon," not literally at nightfall.

This makes sense to me, because after all, we know that "...he descended into hell. On the third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven..." so Jesus isn't even in heaven, speaking in our earthly conception of time, for a whole three days.

also on a comment here  http://www.creedcodecult.com/the-need-for-perfect-law-keeping-part-1/comment-page-1/#comments

I would say, “yes”. God is greater than His Sacraments. However, it would not be normative. There is not one example of such a thing in Scripture. Let me use the Good Thief for an example.

Protestants claim that it is an example of salvation by faith alone. But is it?

— 1 —
He suffered in the flesh. Scripture says:

1 Peter 4:1

1 Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin;
Crucifixion is considered one of the most painful ways to die that man has ever invented. And, as you can see, suffering in the flesh does away with sin. Christ must have known that the Good Thief had expiated his sins by the suffering that he endured on that cross.

— 2 —
He suffered with Jesus. Scripture says:

Romans 8:17King James Version (KJV)

17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
Who can deny that St. Dismas suffered with Christ? There he was suffering on the cross right next to Him. The only one any closer was Mary, His mother, who was spiritually suffering on the Cross with Jesus.

— 3 —

He admonished the sinner.

Do you remember that he reproved and rebuked the other criminal in defense of Jesus Christ? Scripture again says:

1 Thessalonians 5:14 [Full Chapter]
Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the feebleminded, support the weak, be patient toward all men.

This is a spiritual good work of mercy in accordance with the Teaching of the Church:

2447 The works of mercy are charitable actions by which we come to the aid of our neighbor in his spiritual and bodily necessities. Instructing, advising, consoling, comforting are spiritual works of mercy, as are forgiving and bearing wrongs patiently. The corporal works of mercy consist especially in feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned, and burying the dead. Among all these, giving alms to the poor is one of the chief witnesses to fraternal charity: it is also a work of justice pleasing to God:
He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none and he who has food must do likewise. But give for alms those things which are within; and behold, everything is clean for you. If a brother or sister is ill-clad and in lack of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what does it profit?

He gave good witness.

He openly confessed his faith in Jesus Christ, asking Him for salvation.

Matthew 10:32King James Version (KJV)

32 Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.

And I would have posted many other things that he did, but this thing is being temperamental. Suffice to say, that from the Cross, the Good Thief accomplished many good works.

Hanging upon that cross beside Jesus, it is as though the Good Thief was standing before Jesus Christ at the Judgement. Jesus Christ judged the Good Thief according to his works which he had done in the body and knowing that he believed, He counted it to him as righteousness. Just as he does for all who, with the proper disposition of humility and faith, approach the Judgement Seat of Jesus Christ at the Sacraments.

contraception/ links/ etc

http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/07/contraception/

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_25071968_humanae-vitae_en.html


Concerning the top link, Bryan made a comment at 185

November 24th, 2013 10:57 am :
Paul Levy, a pastor in the “International Presbyterian Church,” writes,

Sex within marriage is God’s answer to [sexual] immorality, and so Christians need to work really hard at having good sex lives.

That reminds me of Kant’s notion that we have a duty to pursue happiness, so as to avoid the temptations to violate our duty under unhappy conditions. Contrast the Reformed notion of sex within marriage as the solution to sexual immortality, with the Catholic position. According to the Catholic position, the virtue of chastity, both within marriage and outside of marriage, strengthened by discipline, prayer and the sacraments, is God’s answer to sexual immorality. The Reformed position (as described by Levy) makes single people intrinsically unequipped to avoid falling into sexual immorality. Problems with pornography? Well, he isn’t married, and thus doesn’t have access to the essential antidote to sexual immorality. Hook-up lifestyle? Again, he’s not married, and thus doesn’t have God’s solution to sexual immorality. Date-rape? He just needs to get married. This position reduces the sexual act within marriage to a necessary means for resisting sexual temptation. But it also entails that the lack thereof (or the lack of some variation/permutation of sexual expression between married persons) is the convenient excuse when one fails to resist sexual temptation, both when unmarried, and when married. There is a sense in which what Levy says doesn’t accurately represent what Reformed leaders (Levy included) would say to single people, because they would urge unmarried persons to obey the divine law, and avoid fornication, through “Bible study, accountability groups, prayer, and attentiveness to solid preaching.” (See “Habitual Sin and the Grace of the Sacraments.”) But at the same time, what Levy says isn’t merely a slip of the Reformed tongue. The notion that sex-within-marriage is the solution to sexual immorality is a widely held position among Reformed persons. It treats gratifying and appeasing the sexual appetite as the solution, whereas the Catholic doctrine teaches that training and mastering the sexual appetite is the solution.

{I needed a bit more info so I asked him:

Could you explain the relationship of what you have stated with I Cor 7. This passage popped into my mind as I read your comment. It sounds like it is one factor in resisting temptation [not the only one, for sure]…..but I am not sure I am understanding things correctly. Here is the passage:

“It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” 2 But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. 3 The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5 Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

HE answered in comment 187:


In the Catholic understanding, the quieting of concupiscence is a secondary effect of marriage, and a secondary effect of the marital act within marriage. It is not the purpose of marriage, nor the purpose of the marital act. Rather it is one of the ways in which couples help each other, though necessarily only subordinate to higher ends, as Pope Pius XI teaches:

For in matrimony as well as in the use of the matrimonial rights there are also secondary ends, such as mutual aid, the cultivating of mutual love, and the quieting of concupiscence which husband and wife are not forbidden to consider so long as they are subordinated to the primary end and so long as the intrinsic nature of the act is preserved. (Casti Connubii, 59)

The Holy Spirit / including a long quote from Dr. Ludwig Ott

just wanted to pass some stuff on about the Holy Spirit from Ott's book, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma.  Just note that he puts commas between chapter reference and verse so I Cor. 12,13 means chapter 12 verse 13. ON page 294-5 of my book he writes under

11. The Holy Ghost and the Church

1. The Soul of the Church

     The Holy Ghost is the Soul of the Church. (Sent. communis.)

 

In the Encyclical "Divinum illud" (1897), Leo XIII declared: 'Let the one proposition suffice: Christ is the Head of the Church, the Holy Ghost her soul.  In the Encyclical "Mystici Corporis" (D2288) Pius XII confirmed this doctrine.  In its content it asserts that like the soul in the body, the Holy Ghost is the principle of being and life in the Church.  It is the Holy Ghost who welds together the members of the Church among themselves and with Christ the Head, as the Holy Ghost is entirely in the head and entirely in the members of the Mystical Body.  It is He who by His assistance upholds the hierarchy in the exercise of the teaching office, of the pastoral office and of the sacerdotal office.  It is He who with His grace excites and fosters every salutary activity in the members of the Mystical Body.  All life and growth of the Mystical Body proceeds from the Divine life-principle indwelling in it.

 

This teaching is manifested in the numerous assertions of Holy Scripture on the inner , hidden operation of the Holy Ghost in the Church:  He remains with the disciples of Jesus for all time, in His place (John 14,16).  He lives in them as in a temple (I Cor. 3,16; 6,19).  He binds them all together into one body (I Cor.12,13); He teaches them all and reminds them of all that Jesus said to them (John 14,26; I John 2,27); He gives testimony of Jesus (John 15,26); He leads them to all truth (John 16,13); He speaks in them when they are brought before the Court (Mt. 10,20); He works in them when they confess Jesus as the Lord (I Cor. 12,3)0; He helps to preserve the deposit of faith entrusted to them (2 Tim 1,14); He bestows the extraordinary gifts of grace, and allocates to each as He will (I Cor. 12,11); He molds the Christian to a dwelling of God (Eph 2,22); He effects the forgiveness of sins (John 20,22 et seq), the rebirth (john 3,5), the spiritual renewal (Tit. 3,5); He bestows the spirit of adoption of sons (Rom 8,15); He pours out love into the hearts of the faithful (Rom. 5,5); He brings forth all the Christian virtues (Gal.5,22); He inducts the superiors of the Church (Acts 20,280; He directs them in their official activity (Acts 15,280; He takes pity on our weakness and pleads with us before the Father (Rom. 8,26); supported by Him we cry to God: 'Abba Father' (Rom.8,15; Gao. 4,6).

 

The Fathers attest the intimate connection of the Holy Ghost with the Church.  St. Irenaeus says: "Where the Church is, there is also the Spirit of God; and where the Spirit of God is, there is the Church and all grace' (Adv. haer. III 24,I)  St. Augustine compares the working of the Holy Ghost in the Church to the working of the soul in the body:  'What the soul is for the body of man that the Holy Ghost is for the body of Christ, that, is, the Church.  The Holy Ghost operates in the whole Church that which the soul operates in the members of the one body.'    As the soul quickens every member of the body and bestows a definite function on each, so the Holy Ghost, by His grace, quickens every member of the Church, and allocates to each a definite activity in the service of the whole.  Through one He works miracles, through others He proclaims the truth; in one He preserves virginity, in another marital chastity; in one He effects this, in another that.  As the soul does not follow the member that is cut off from the body, so also the Holy Ghost does not dwell in the member who separates itself from the body of the Church (Sermo 267, 4,4). Scholasticism adopted the thought of St. Augustine, for example, St. Thomas in his Commentary on the Apostles 'Creed (a.9). In another metaphor St. Thomas calls the Holy Ghost the Heart of the Church (cor Ecclesiae), based on the Aristotelian thought that the heart is the central organ, out of which all life-powers stream to the body.  In analogous manner the Holy Ghost is the universal principle, from which all supernatural life-powers, that is , all graces, overflow to the Church, the Head (Christ as to His humanity) and the members.  As the heart with its universal efficacy is invisible to the eye, so also the Holy Ghost and His universal quickening and uniting efficacy in the Church is invisible.  Thus the Holy Ghost is very appropriately compared to the heart, while Christ, as to His sensory human nature is very appropriately compared to the head (S. th. III 8, I and 3).  Prescinding from picturesque language, St. Thomas says of the relationship of the Holy Ghost to the Church:  The Holy Ghost unites, quickens, teaches, sanctifies the Church, indwells in her, communicates the riches of the one to the others.  CF. S. th. 2 II 1,9 ad 5:  III 8, I ad3; III 68,9 ad 2; In I Cor. c. 12 lect. 2."

Why the Church faces East/ why the altar faces east