Learn by Topic: Purgatory

Freedom, Responsibility, Conscience and Consequences

God created Man as a rational being (CCC 1730) with free will, the ability to choose between good and evil (CCC 1732), responsibility for choices (CCC 1734), a conscience to guide choices (CCC 1777-1802) and consequences for those choices (CCC 1008).   At Eden (Gen 3:1-24), Man abused his freedom by disobeying God’s commandment and experienced a guilty conscience (CCC 397). In this Original Sin, Man broke harmony with God (CCC 400, 416, 1707, 1739), was immediately held responsible for his choices, bearing the consequences (Gen 3:24).  After Eden, God continues to grant Man freedom and holds Man responsible for choices Man makes (CCC 1745).  Freedom, responsibility and consequences cannot be separated; this is how God designed Creation.

Man’s Attempt to Escape the Inescapable

Modern Man abuses freedom by avoiding responsibility, ignoring conscience and avoiding consequences for choices made.  Man’s abuses of freedom are evident: the desire for sex with no responsibility, the clamoring for rights without responsibilities, exploiting legal loopholes to avoid consequences, aborting children to avoid parenthood, etc.  Man’s conscience about inherent good and evil is being dulled through the totalitarian imposition of moral relativism by government and the courts, a politically correct culture and the increasingly immoral media.  But, Man cannot escape the consequences of choices made: in this life, evil choices yield turmoil, sooner or later (e.g. broken relationships, the despair of guilty conscience, ill health, retribution, etc.); Man’s graver consequences are in the life to come. The Judgment of Jesus Christ is inescapable.

Jesus Christ – Divine Judge

Every man will stand in judgment before Jesus Christ, the Divine Judge.  Jesus: (more…)