(crickets chirping)
(whooshing)
KAI: Hello?
(ominous music)
DEATH LIBBY: It is I, Kaiser Johnson!
Remember that you will be called to your judgment.
KAI: What, me?
Not yet!
I'm young, I'm healthy, I'm in my prime, see!
I can do burpees too.
I'm not going to.
DEATH LIBBY: For all earthly mortals, the earthly pilgrimage
comes to an end.
KAI: Where am I going?
Is Heaven for real?
Where is it?
What about my unbelieving friends?
Will Jesus judge me?
Am I going to the other place?
DEATH LIBBY: Those are good questions, Kaiser Johnson,
but it is not I who can answer them.
Maybe you'll find out more on this episode,
called "Life After Life."
KAI: "Life After Life?"
Maybe I can finally jump through walls!
DEATH LIBBY: Yeah, you're not dead yet.
(crashing)
Ouch.
(upbeat music)
LIBBY: Hello, I'm Libby.
KAI: And I'm Kai.
LIBBY: And welcome to Catholic Central.
Today we're exploring life after life.
KAI: To be or not to be?
LIBBY: Is not really the question,
because we believe we be forever.
We never stop existing.
The question is, what is it like to be in the next life?
KAI: Good point, what did Hamlet know?
(crashing)
LIBBY: That's not what I was...
KAI: Most people who grew up in the Catholic faith
were taught that when we die,
we go to Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory.
LIBBY: Yeah, depending on whether
you were really good, really bad, or meh.
KAI: The theology of the afterlife
is much deeper than that.
Eternity's not so much a long stretch of time
after we die, but eternity exists
in a kind of forever now.
There isn't a before or after.
LIBBY: Yes, time is an earthly construct.
There's another dimension beyond.
KAI: So, if Heaven and Hell exist,
does that mean they're real places?
LIBBY: The Catholic answer is absolutely yes,
but not like physical spaces on Earth
like you could locate on Google Maps.
KAI: And when Catholics speak about
the resurrection of the body,
they don't mean your current flesh and bones
will be the same.
LIBBY: It's a different kind of real,
but it's totally real and really you.
KAI: But let's get to the burning questions:
how good do you have to be to get to Heaven
and how bad do you have to be to land in Hell?
LIBBY: Why don't we start with Heaven?
KAI: Heaven, a heavenly place where you live with God
and all the souls who've gone before you,
like grandma, who's singing only slightly
off-key with the angels.
LIBBY: It's great, and by great, I mean so boring.
KAI: We have to ditch our Sunday School images of Heaven.
It's not about harps and people in sheets.
The truth is, we are being invited
to be one with the creator of the galaxies,
and in communion with all the blessed people who ever were.
LIBBY: And while we don't really know what Heaven looks like,
we are told what it feels like: coming home.
KAI: Never lonely, always loved.
Every human feels that restless longing
for a home that doesn't fully exist here on Earth.
LIBBY: But Jesus also said the Kingdom of Heaven is within you.
We can have a taste of eternity now.
KAI: Now?
LIBBY: Jesus said, "Love the creator of the universe
and your neighbor as much as you love yourself."
Is life all about me, or can I give up my self-centeredness?
That's what it takes.
KAI: That's all?
Okay, well, yeah. LIBBY: Exactly, which is why
we tend to want to put off Heaven till we die.
KAI: Which I guess brings us to Purgatory,
the place for people not quite ready
for prime time Heaven.
LIBBY: The word Purgatory is not found in scripture,
but the idea of an in-between place
does have a scriptural basis,
a place where people are purified
and healed from what the Church calls
the enduring effects of sin and a life of self-centeredness.
ST. PETER KAI: Welcome!
LIBBY: Am I really going to get into Heaven?
ST. PETER KAI: Sure, kid, you're metaphorical inches
and/or minutes away from entering into
the ultimate, totally awesome beauty
of the mystery of the universe, the Holy Trinity.
Were you given your cards?
LIBBY: Oh, yes, here are my sins and my bad stuff,
my greed, my vanity, my fears, my mistakes.
ST. PETER KAI: Jesus is already working on those.
He judged you, and if you asked him,
he forgave all that.
LIBBY: I did, so why am I being sent to Purgatory?
ST. PETER KAI: Because sins have consequences,
even after they're forgiven.
LIBBY: What?
ST. PETER KAI: Okay, think of it this way:
I'm in bed with a terrible illness.
The day comes when the germs are gone
and I'm healed from the disease,
but I'm still weak, maybe from
the lingering effects of it
and I need time to recover.
The same with sin.
LIBBY: I get it, Purgatory, purged, purified completely.
ST. PETER KAI: Yes, but there's more.
Your other cards.
LIBBY: These?
Oh, yes, the things I value most about myself
and what I love.
I have my hometown, my collection of minute horse figurines,
my regular church attendance, my career.
ST. PETER KAI: Very good, but I need those too.
LIBBY: What?
ST. PETER KAI: Give up all earthly attachments,
good and bad, and enter freely, with pure love for God.
LIBBY: I do love God, but these cards are good things.
I can't imagine myself without them.
ST. PETER KAI: Purify, complete surrender.
Your choice.
Purgatory's that-a-way.
LIBBY: Okay, good, well, that sums up today's topic.
KAI: Libby!
LIBBY: We've all got some letting go to do, I imagine.
KAI: Libby, we still haven't discussed
the final destination.
LIBBY: Aw, Hell, I was hoping we could skip that.
KAI: Hell, Hades, Sheol,
the infernal fire and brimstone,
pitchforks and devils in red pajamas!
LIBBY: Wrong.
If Heaven is being at one with God
in communion with all good things,
for Catholics, Hell is utter isolation,
being totally separated from love,
from God, and all others.
KAI: Eternal solitary confinement
with me, myself, and I.
LIBBY: When Jesus spoke of Hell, he used the term Gehenna,
a place near Jerusalem of pagan child sacrifice in fire.
KAI: These images aren't meant to be literal,
but to illustrate how a soul must feel
when it's outside Jerusalem.
LIBBY: We've all had a sense of that feeling,
being outside of Jerusalem,
separated from people you love,
especially when you've been betrayed
or you have betrayed someone.
KAI: It's Hell.
LIBBY: The Catechism of the Catholic Church
describes Hell as "a state of definitive
"self-exclusion from God and from those who love God."
KAI: Self-exclusion, which means that God doesn't
send anyone to Hell.
A person chooses Hell by absolutely rejecting God
through his or her words, actions, and attitudes
towards God and towards other people.
LIBBY: The question is, have a person's words and actions
in this life made them ready for the next?
Of course, even if people do reject God,
God still loves them.
The Church teaches that Hell exists,
but that God created everyone for Heaven.
KAI: Finally, you might be asking,
what of the person who's never heard of Jesus?
LIBBY: Catholics believe that salvation
is only possible through Jesus,
but also that God reveals Jesus
to everyone by whatever means possible.
KAI: So, those who've never heard of Jesus
may have honestly sought the truth
and lived lives of self-giving love
and goodwill to all.
It's like they were followers of Jesus
without even knowing it.
LIBBY: The Church says that, through God's grace,
the possibility of Heaven is open to them too.
KAI: And maybe even to that unbelieving friend
you lost in a balloon accident.
That really great guy who cared about everybody,
would give you the shirt off his back,
but you did have to wonder about
the whole ballooning thing.
LIBBY: As for believing Christians,
they have the gift of added confidence
because of their faith in life in Christ.
KAI: But it's still up to each one of them
to choose to follow Jesus daily.
Not always the easy thing, but as Jesus promised them,
a chance to really matter, to push the world forward,
a path to the fullest life possible, and beyond.
LIBBY: Choice, it always comes back to choice.
KAI: So, today, we presented the Catholic view
of life after life, Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory.
LIBBY: We talked about eternity, where our transformed bodies
exist outside of time and the physical world.
KAI: We talked about Purgatory,
where you can finally let go
of all earthly attachments.
LIBBY: We talked about Heaven and Hell,
not as some place out there based on
a reward or punishment system,
but as a part of an eternal invitation from God
to eternal communion.
KAI: So, that's it for this episode of Catholic Central.
I'm Kai.
LIBBY: And I'm Libby.
And remember, eternity is a state of being
you can begin to live now, day by day.
KAI: Absolutely, my thoughts exactly.
No worries, I'm ready.
DEATH LIBBY: What were you saying?
(upbeat music)