Jesus Christ was the rightest, brightest, sanest person Who ever lived. Matthew 16: 18-20 lets us see what He told the first Pope when He established His Church:
Our most pressing concern should be saving our immortal soul so that it may live in joy forever. Those who separate themselves from Him and His Church have a proportionately harder time saving their souls. The farther one gets from Him and His Church, the less likely it is that one’s soul will be saved.
The Church may be imagined as the sun. Those who orbit closely believe in The Trinity, The Sacraments, and strive to worthily receive them. If people choose more distant orbits, The Church Jesus began is replaced by home-made theories from vain, self-appointed experts. The distantly orbiting souls become ever father from Truth, make more mistakes, and must be less likely to save their souls.
Those orbiting far from The Church let other concerns and desires come between them and salvation. The proper sense of priorities is destroyed. Many allow their souls to be so shrunken, darkened, or stained by Pride, Envy, Greed, Gluttony, Anger, Lust, and Sloth that they simply cannot get into Heaven.
Will such souls get to Purgatory?
Big questions about Purgatory. 1. Will those who rejected Jesus’ promise to provide “the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven” to The Church He built on Peter be allowed to go Purgatory? 2. Will they be told at Judgment: “You could have believed Jesus, Who gave The Church the power to forgive sins and provide the doctrine of Purgatory. You rejected Jesus’ words,. And you have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Worse, you have rejected Confession, Absolution, and the Last Rites. There can be no cleansing in Purgatory, and therefore, no Heaven, for you.”
And, the trap door opens.
