Purgatory’s back!

While attending a funeral Mass in my home town recently I was surprised to hear the celebrant praying that my deceased friend would not spend too long in purgatory.

Back in the 1950s during my childhood years, purgatory was seldom far from the lips of teachers during religion classes and priests warned congregations about the place from pulpits.

Like the near extinct corncrake, I thought the ‘p’ word had disappeared from Catholic church teaching, only for it to be dug out of the archives by the ‘Father Trendy’ of my parish.

Such contributions from the pulpit are only helping to further distance people like myself, a lukewarm Catholic, from regularly attending Mass. Bill McMahon, Navan, Co. Meath.