Is it in bad taste, even insensitive, to speak of purgatory at a funeral?

Bringing Up Purgatory at a Funeral?

by Joan Desmond

Is it in bad taste, even insensitive, to speak of purgatory at a funeral?

Many seem to think so. In my experience, most homilists at funeral Masses report that our loved one is already in heaven, and we should hold onto that thought as we grieve our loss.

So I was startled this month when the homilist at a recent funeral Mass for an old friend asked the congregation to pray for him in purgatory. The priest added, as if anticipating the shock of some mourners: “It seems to me, any Christian who does not accept purgatory, diminishes God’s love for man, and at the same time devalues the beauty of the human person."

His intriguing words grabbed my attention.

The priest, Dominican Father Paul Raftery, began his reflection noting the fact that the deceased, whom I will call Bill, had spent many years in a wheelchair following a stroke. It was radical change of life for a father of two teenagers. But Bill, in a conversation with one of his daughters shortly before his death, described it as a “blessing.”

Granted, Bill hadn’t asked for the debilitating effects of the stroke. But, as he put it, we rarely ask for the hardships that often "lead us to the Father’s house."

“With God there are always special reasons for suffering,” said t Father Raftery during his homily. “This is what we find in our first reading (Wis. 3.1-9). As gold in the furnace, he proved them, and as sacrificial offerings he took them to himself. In the time of their visitation they shall shine, and shall dart about as sparks through stubble…”

The Dominican further observed, “Those mining for valuable metal must all the time come across ore that isn’t worth putting in the furnace. They just leave it. It’s worthless. And they keep looking for the really valuable ore. That is what they put in the furnace.

“When God sends us suffering, that act always means: You are gold for Me. I will never discard you, or put you aside. So much is hidden in you, so much radiance, that my love moves me to purify all that detracts from your perfection, to bring you to full splendor.

“So for years in bearing with his stroke, this was Bill. He was in the furnace of God’s love in order to bring out the pure gold that is in him.

“And now we offer this Holy Mass, that if this purifying love of God is still active for Bill in purgatory, we can help him.”

“In effect, if there is no purgatory, then so many souls leaving this world end up being abandoned by God as not worth rehabilitating, not worth further purification. They are useless ore to be cast aside.

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