📖Overview

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, The Christian who unites his own death to that of Jesus views death as a step toward Christ and an entrance into everlasting life. The Church teaches that each person receives eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the very moment of death, in a particular judgment that refers his life to Christ. Those who die in God's grace and friendship and are perfectly purified live forever with Christ in heaven, enjoying the beatific vision, seeing God face to face as He truly is. Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfillment of the deepest human longings, the state of supreme, definitive happiness. Those who die in God's grace but are still imperfectly purified undergo purification in Purgatory, to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. The prayers of the living, especially the Eucharistic sacrifice, can help the souls in Purgatory. Those who die in a state of mortal sin, having freely and definitively turned away from God, descend to hell, which is the state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed. God predestines no one to hell; this requires a free and willful turning away from God persisted in until the end. At the end of time, Christ will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and the Kingdom of God will be brought to its fulfillment in the new heavens and new earth.

💡Key Points