Friar researched purgatory DVD with local help

Conventual Franciscan Friar John Clote wants to clear the air about purgatory – a subject many Catholics misunderstand.

To illuminate the mystery, meaning and hope behind purgatory, he’s written and produced the DVD documentary, “Purgatory: The Forgotten Church” (www.purgatoryforgottenchurch.com).

“The church does not teach purgatory as a place; it’s a state of purification after death,” Friar Clote said. “The church teaches that prayer and good works offered up for the holy souls of purgatory are beneficial to the holy souls.”

While he tackled the theology behind purgatory, Friar Clote hopes the main message viewers get from the film is that it’s about relationships.

“First and foremost with God, our relationship with each other and our relationships in the context of the communion of saints,” he said.

Friar Clote said we don’t forget about friends and relatives who have died.

“People we still think about, but do we pray for them?” he asked. “They pray for us. … There are a million different ways how our loved ones reach out to us individually in very meaningful ways … There’s an intimacy here that exists that is often more clear in death than it is in life. I tried to show that in the film through the stories and underlying theology. … The idea of the forgotten church – it’s people and relationships and prayer that is forgotten, and you need to be reminded.”

Purgatory teachings
The Catholic Church throughout the centuries has urged the faithful to pray for the holy souls in purgatory who haven’t yet gained the joys of heaven. Friar Clote discovered purgatory references dating to the Greeks. He learned how the Christian tradition of praying for the dead fell out of favor after the 1517 Protestant Reformation when Martin Luther rejected it. He illuminated the worth of purgatory through several saints’ views on it.

St. Catherine Genoa said our prayers help souls unite with God. St. Faustina Kowalska saw that part of her earthly mission was to pray for the dead souls. Recently canonized St. John Paul II mentioned how Christians shouldn’t forget about the holy souls in purgatory.

Local experts
To present further theology on purgatory, Friar Clote sought the late Jesuit theologian Gerald Fagin, who taught at Loyola University New Orleans; local Redemptorist Father Byron Miller, vice postulator of the canonization cause of Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos, whom Friar Clote met while doing a documentary on Blessed Seelos; Jesuit Father James Kubicki; and Cardinal Francis George.

He also interviewed Tulane University professor Ann Masso and Dr. Jeffrey Long from Houma, who has written the book, “Evidence of the Afterlife: The Science of Near-Death Experiences.”

Father Fagin called purgatory the purification between death and entering into eternal life; a way after death to do penance for our sins on earth.

‘Consciousness’ explored
Dr. Long, a radiation oncologist in Houma and board member of The International Association for Near-Death Studies, explored the secular view – the science behind what happens after death. Long and his wife have researched people with near-death experiences who had a heightened consciousness after death that is medically inexplicable.

“There is this inclination to believe – even if you are not Catholic, Christian, religious – that with the death of the body, the consciousness survives. That’s the key question in the film,” Friar Clote said.

‘Longing for God’
Also interviewed is renowned purgatory writer Susan Tassone, who wrote “Prayers, Promises and Devotions for the Holy Souls in Purgatory,” “The Way of the Cross for the Holy Souls in Purgatory,” “Praying with the Saints for the Holy Souls in Purgatory,” “The Rosary for the Holy Souls in Purgatory,” and “Thirty-Day Devotions for the Holy Souls.”

“Our greatest suffering is longing for God; the loss of the sight of God,” she said. “Once the soul sees God and has to go to purgatory, it is in agony. It’s the worst suffering it can experience.”

Once he had the fundamental theology on purgatory, Friar Clote knew he was lacking the relational aspect of the after-life. He then interviewed an Episcopalian priest turned Catholic priest, Father Doug Lorig, the pastor at St. Maria Goretti Church in Scottsdale, Ariz.

Father Lorig reveals several interesting encounters with the holy souls. He believes his prayers for the souls have helped liberate them from purgatory.

“Father Lorig put flesh on the bone,” Friar Clote said.

Friar Clote, a solemnly professed friar assigned to the Basilica of St. Josaphat in Milwaukee who has master’s degrees in spiritual theology and divinity and is studying toward priesthood, sees documentary films as a niche to touch lives.

Attuned to new evagelization
Friar Clote is following the charism of St. Maximilian Kolbe, who used contemporary medium to spread the Gospel message. He has completed 14 full-length films, among them “Seelos: Tireless Intercessor”; “Ocean of Mercy” on St. Maxmilian Kolbe, a Franciscan martyr who died at Auschwitz; “Solanus Casey: Priest, Porter, Prophet”; and “Fourteen Flowers of Pardon: The Life and Death of St. Maria Goretti.”

“I see my vocation as administering the sacraments; and administering the sacrament of story,” Friar Clote said. “It allows things that are invisible to become visible. It’s God’s grace visible.”

He said Catholic filmmaking has brought him closer to universal truths and themes that resonate with a broad audience: what it means to be a human being; what it means to love, to suffer, to experience a full life as Jesus intended.

“Ultimately the sacrament of story has the capacity to transcend, to communicate, to convince, to persuade and ultimately to show people mercy,” he said.

Pray more for the departed
Friar Clote hopes “Purgatory” will provoke viewers to do something – to have Masses said for departed souls, to reconnect with their departed loved ones or even those who are living.

He wants people to know that the poor souls need our prayers to get to God. Prayer connects us.

“Pray if you have an urge to pray for someone,” he said.

The DVD has a website, www.purgatoryforgottenchurch.com.

Christine Bordelon can be reached at [email protected].