Is the Catholic concept of Purgatory more accurate than heaven vs hell?

I have been asking myself this question since 1990 when I began to study near death experience accounts?

Twenty eight years later after studying hundreds of NDE's I think that yes... the Roman Catholic idea of Purgatory is closer to the full truth than the Protestant heaven vs hell teachings. I believe that the key to understanding this is to realize that time is an invention...... that was created by the most off the scale intellect in the universe / Multiverse... and time... was invented to assist human and angelic souls to progress from point A to point B spiritually, mentally, emotionally and yes... even in the types of bodies that we are given.

I replied:
Purgatory is just a word...... it is subject to definition....... it may have been the closest word that your dad could think of even after several months of being in a higher dimension of space - time. For example.... the word translated "forever" in the Bible in English..... comes from a Hebrew word that actually means....."until the end of conditions last."

https://www.near-death.com/experiences/notable/george-ritchie.html#a05d

Please notice this last sentence:
"These are the spirits of people who grew beyond selfish desires while on Earth; but, like the spirits in hell, these spirits cannot see Jesus either." (Dr. George Ritchie)....
if these spirits cannot see Jesus.....
are they in the Christian heaven????

 

Not sure why you believe people who say they see things when they are dead.

How do you know they aren't lying?

 

The Catholic church puts a bad spin on it. Most, when they pass, need to rest and recharge before taking on the next challenge.
There is no punishment and there is no judgment. In my studies, I've never heard anyone on the spirit side call it purgatory, but it sounds like the resting place.

 

Your reply is written in an unintentionally funny way. If they're dead and they see things, they're on the spirit side, and then they are told to cross back over just so they could tell us a lie? A dead man has no reason to lie - he's dead.

 

Of course I can't absolutely KNOW that they aren't lying but.......
when a child of three years and ten months of age has an NDE.....
and begins to tell his parents about it a year or so later.... and knows things that he cannot
humanly know....... then I am faced with a choice to believe him or not........
and I personally believe that Colton Burpo is a HIGHLY credible witness of what he saw in what I believe was a higher invisible dimension of space - time.

So far... mine is the only Yes to this poll:

http://www.politicalforum.com/index...aven-is-for-real-and-ask-you-about-it.518250/

Friends of yours watch Heaven Is For Real and ask you about it?

Is Colton Burpo a credible witness?

1. 
   No....
   5 vote(s)
   71.4%
2. *
   Yes....
   1 vote(s)
   14.3%
3. 
   I am not sure but I am going to research this further.
   1 vote(s)
   14.3%

Change Your Vote

 

True...... a more modern term for whatever that place is
is... The Void!

https://www.near-death.com/science/research/afterlife-realms.html

 

There are ghost stories and alien abduction stories also from very credible people and some contain things they couldn't know either.

And why are there so many NDE stories where nothing happens?

Is God only selecting certain people to see them?

What makes these people so tight with God?

 

Stuff happens, they just don't remember what. God doesn't select or reject. No one is rejected.

 

So God is going to go out of His way to show someone something only for them to forget about it?

That seems unlikely.

 

Most likely it wasn't a true NDE. In fact if they didn't see anything, it wouldn't be classified as an NDE. But for those who did see the spirit side, why would they lie? God is not going to be there to greet you when you cross over and give you the grand tour.

 

Unless of course you happen to be a humble, childlike, teachable Atheist..........
who is basically fearless and you astral project right up to the being of light of NDE fame.....

... and you start asking good questions.... in which case.......
you do indeed get the grand tour........
many Atheists are NOT so humble and teachable and curious as former Atheist Mellen Benedict..........

https://www.near-death.com/reincarnation/experiences/mellen-thomas-benedict.html#a05

Some of you who own "Stephen Hawking's Universe" might wish to compare all this with chapter 13 that is entitled The Anthropic Principle. And as you read.... say a little prayer for Dr. Hawking...... because after reading that chapter I asked myself many times.......
could Dr. Stephen Hawking be a closet Theist........
who just set all of us Theists up???????????????????????????

...... So well that we can get ourselves kicked off .... and even banned forever from.........Richard Dawkins Ph. D. groups and pages..... in spite of all our efforts to be basically polite.... and diplomatic!

 

But many near death experiencers remember.... important parts of what they were shown.......
when it comes time for them to do something with it.........

For example....IF.... (and I am not saying that he was because I don't know for certain)... but if the Apostle Paul himself had had a near death experience....... (my guess would be at Lystra where he had been stoned and APPEARED to be dead)........
he just could not deal with all the information overload while he wrote II Corinthians 12....BUT.... by the time that he wrote Romans 9, 10, and 11.... he was dealing with some awfully heavy.........
and many Christians might think.....UNLAWFUL.... ideas.......

https://www.near-death.com/experiences/notable/christian-andreason.html#a04h

 

I think that it is just so seriously cool that Ms. Beverly Brodsky can.......
remember blasting G-d for allowing the holocaust to occur..........
...... I am twice divorced....... and I think I can really identify with G-d when it comes to this......
(OK... maybe not... .because failing to meet somebody's financial expectations for you is a lot less serious than allowing......... permitting....
The Holocaust?!)

https://www.near-death.com/religion/judaism/beverly-brodsky.html

....

 

Maurice Rawlings M. D. hypnotized many of his heart patients.......
and when regressed in time to when they flatlined........
they had a scary experience that would tend to remind us of a place.......
that a certain somebody might advise to poke out our right eye.....
or chop off our right hand........
(or.... OK.... dump the computer if we can't resist the porn sites as portrayed by Kirk Cameron in the Christian movie.......
Fireproof)......




... but if we go to hell......
and get revived.... what do we term where we were?????


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fireproof_(film)

 

purgatory is just as imaginary as heaven or hell.

 

Our imaginations.....
and our expectations... and our own guilt and shame...... are powerful forces but......

why did former Atheist Howard Storm Ph. D. so radically alter his behavior after his NDE if he did not consider it real?



... and... if Howard Storm did not take the idea of Purgatory seriously... why did he contact a Roman Catholic priest to discuss his perhaps becoming Catholic..... (he was advised to stay where he was because the priest felt he was doing an awesome job as a Protestant pastor)......




.... (I am not entirely certain if this is the video where Howard talks about almost becoming Roman Catholic but..... it is definitely one of the follow up interviews after the first video that I give here in this post. )

 

Why do some people join a cult and take their own lives?

That isn't proof of anything being real.

I don't think if God sends you to a place that you can simply be revived out of it against His wishes.

They obviously experienced something that happens during the dying process, probably like a dream, not the actual end result.

Its like that show way back when that had the medical students killing themselves then reviving just so they could experience what was on the other side.

God tells us what awaits us, he doesn't need to have any more "messengers" relaying His plans and its not possible for someone to accidentally pop into a Hell or Heaven or Purgatory then be whisked back.

That would imply that God isn't aware of what's going on.

Its safe to say that what these people are experiencing is totally contained on the human side. Just like a certain drug has a certain effect on the majority of people I'm sure dying is kind of the same thing.

 

He very well may have had that but it was from God who was using Paul for His message.

Unless you are claiming these current NDE people are here to deliver messages from God its not the same thing.

 

If..... the being of light who reviews lives.......
(especially with Christians)...... is none other than Messiah Yeshua - Jesus... keeping several of H-s promises........ then.........
these genuine NDE accounts could be Messiah Yeshua keeping this promise:

John 16:25

"These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father."

This would be another relevant promise that .....
NDE accounts seem to be the fulfillment of:

John 5:22

"For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:"

There isn't a whole lot of wiggle room on this question..... from what I have read:

The being of light of NDE fame, G-d or Satan?

 

The producers of "Flatliners"........
may have wanted to make NDE accounts appear to be as negative as they could possibly make them look......
and from what I have read about the top of the top of the top of Hollywood... I have a theory on that..... but if Howard Storm Ph. D. had joined a "CULT"... then when he went to a Roman Catholic priest and asked about becoming Catholic.......
he would not have been advised to stay where he was.........
(My theory is that the priest may have discerned that Howard might just remarry..... which is exactly what he did indeed do..... and his second wife assists him with all his efforts for all his readers)!

https://www.near-death.com/experiences/notable/howard-storm.html

His first wife divorced him largely because of his leaving his position as the Head of the Art Department at the university he had been teaching at for so long...... only to go back to study to become a pastor!

 

Pastor Bob Jones........
was zealous even before his NDE... but he sure would not claim to have been "tight with G-d".... actually......
he stated that of the first three major levels to heaven that he had been shown..... .he only felt comfortable in the first level.........
the second and third level.......
were just too energetic for him during his NDE in 1975.......



Bob Jones describes 3 of the levels of heaven

Bob Jones says that the light in the second heaven was more severe... and hurt his head!

He said he was very uncomfortable in the third level... because the light there was more than he could bear. He said the throne was at the third level........ so Bob Jones...... wasn't all that tight with G-d really..........

 

He also claimed that when he was seven years old the archangel Gabrielle appeared before him and blew a trumpet in his face.

Jones was also removed from his ministry duties at the Vineyard due to sexual misconduct. This misconduct did not include intercourse, but consisted of encouraging women to undress in his office so they could stand “naked before the Lord” in order to receive a “word.”

http://www.apologeticsindex.org/3721-bob-jones

Sorry man but this guy is a crackpot.

I feel bad for anyone that takes him seriously.

 

you really need to get off this NDE kick. Hallucinations are not evidence of some magical other worldly plain of existence.

 

Helen Wambach Ph. D. hypnotized 1088 people and got them to visualize further and further back in time......
Ninety percent of her volunteers could be hypnotized and saw past lives......

Her second book was about what people saw between each of those past lives......
and when Dr. Wambach took people to the time of their deaths in those past lives......
the basic near death experience of floating outside one's body...... meeting deceased relatives.....
reviewing their lives.....
was seen again and again by her volunteers.

Over ninety percent of those "past lives" viewed in the Helen Wambach Ph. D. research were
of relatively poor people......
which is not what we would expect if they were visualizing something from books they had read.

It is amazing how many way in which the NDE state of consciousness can be accessed.

https://www.near-death.com/experiences/triggers.html

 

as I said, hallucinations are not evidence of anything other than malfunctioning brain chemistry.