Incidental to the Church’s teaching on Purgatory—a place not a few of us are likely to spend some time in—is the fact that if it did not exist it would surely have to be invented. Now how consoling is that? And do not take my word for it. It was our late pope Benedict XVI—who, for all we know, may still be there himself—who first said it back in 1985 when, as Cardinal Prefect for the Congregation…
