Outlines of Ecclesiastical History

by B. H. Roberts

[190]. An exception must be made in the case of the Roman Catholic Church. Catholics do not believe that all Christians at death go immediately into heaven, but on the contrary "believe that a Christian who dies after the guilt and everlasting punishment of mortal sins have been forgiven him, but who, either from want of opportunity or through his negligence, has not discharged the debt of temporal punishment due to his sin, will have to discharge that debt to the justice of God in purgatory." "Purgatory is a state of suffering after this life, in which those souls are for a time detained, which depart this life after their deadly sins have been remitted as to the stain and guilt, and as to the everlasting pain that was due to them; but which souls have on account of those sins still some temporal punishment to pay; as also those souls which leave this world guilty only of venial [pardonable] sins. In purgatory these souls are purified and rendered fit to enter into heaven, where nothing defiled enters." The quotations in the above are from Catholic Belief, by Bruno, D. D. of the Catholic church. As all works of the Catholic church accessible to me have nothing on the different degrees of glory, I conclude that Catholic teaching is that they who attain unto heaven are all equal in glory.

[191]. I Kings viii:27.

[192]. II Cor. xii:2-4.

[193]. I Cor. xv:40-42.

[194]. The circumstances under which the revelation was given are these: The Prophet Joseph and Sidney Rigdon were engaged in revising the Jewish scriptures. When they came to St. John, ch. v:29—speaking of the resurrection of the dead, concerning those that should hear the voice of the Son of Man and come forth, instead of reading in the text of our common English Bibles—"And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation," the following was given to them by the Spirit: "And shall come forth they who have done good in the resurrection of the just, and they who have done evil in the resurrection of the unjust." This reading of the passage caused them to marvel as it was given to them by inspiration; and while they pondered on this thing the Spirit of God enveloped them, and they saw the Lord Jesus Christ and those different glories which men will inherit, an account of which is given in the text. The vision is recorded in Doc. and Cov., sec. lxxvi.

[195]. "Servants of God, but not Gods nor the sons of God," remarks Apostle Orson Pratt in his foot note on the passage from which this is condensed. Doc. and Cov. sec. lxxvi:112.

[196]. Doc. and Cov., sec. cxxxi:1.

[197]. Doc. and Cov., sec. lxxvi.

[198]. Those desiring to verify the statements of the text will consult with care Heb. vi:4-8 and Doc. and Cov., sec. lxxvi:25-48.

[199]. It may sound like sacrilege in modern ears to speak of man becoming as God. Yet why should it be so considered? Man is the offspring of God, he is of the same race, and hath within him—undeveloped, it is true—the faculties and attributes of his Father. He hath also before him an eternity of time in which to develop both the faculties of the mind and the attributes of the soul—why should it be accounted a strange thing that at last the child shall arrive at the same exaltation and partake of the same intelligence and glory with his Father? If Jesus Christ, "being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God" (Philippians ii:6), why should it be thought blasphemous to teach that man by faith and righteousness in following the counsels of God shall at last become like him, and share in his power and glory, being a God, even a son of God? I grant you the height from our present position looks tremendous; yet it is not impossible of attainment, since we have eternity in which to work. Stand by the cradle of a new-born babe and contemplate it. Within that little body of organized pulp—with eyes incapable of distinguishing objects; legs unable to bear the weight of its body—without the power of locomotion; hands over whose movements it hath no control; ears that hear but cannot distinguish sounds; a tongue that cannot speak—yet within that little helpless tabernacle what powers lie dormant! Within that germ in the cradle are latent powers which only require time for their unfolding to astonish the world. From it may come the man of profound learning who shall add something by his own wisdom to the sum total of human knowledge. Perhaps from that germ shall come a profound historian, a poet or eloquent orator to sway the reason and passions of men, and guide them to better and purer things than they have yet known. Or a statesman may be there in embryo; a man whose wisdom shall guide the destiny of the state, or perhaps with God-like power rule the world. If from such a germ as this in the cradle may come such an unfolding of power as we see in the highest and noblest manhood, may it not be, that taking that highest and noblest manhood as the germ, that from it may come, under the guiding hand of our Father in heaven, a still more wonderful unfolding, until the germ of highest and noblest manhood shall develop into a God! The distance between the noblest man and the position of a God is greater than that between the infant in the cradle and the highest development of manhood; but if so, there is a longer time—eternity—in which to arrive at the result; and a God and heavenly influences instead of the human parent and earthly means to bring to pass the necessary development.—Roberts.