Inclination to Indulge

This news item on the resurrection of an ancient practice called the indulgence into mainstream Catholicism leaves one wondering if it is supposed to signal a more conservative shift in Catholic beliefs or what it is touted to be - bringing back the idea of personal sin and appropriate repentance.

The indulgence is among the less noticed and less disputed traditions to be restored to Roman Catholics. According to church teaching, even after sinners are absolved in the confessional and say their Our Fathers or Hail Marys as penance, they still face punishment after death, in Purgatory, before they can enter heaven. In exchange for certain prayers, devotions or pilgrimages in special years, a Catholic can receive an indulgence, which reduces or erases that punishment instantly, with no formal ceremony or sacrament. There are partial indulgences, which reduce purgatorial time by a certain number of days or years, and plenary indulgences, which eliminate all of it, until another sin is committed. You can get one for yourself, or for someone who is dead. Any Catholic could receive an indulgence by fulfilling the basic requirements: going to confession, receiving Holy Communion, saying a prayer for the pope and achieving “complete detachment from any inclination to sin.”