PART TWO – PURIFYING MYSTERIES
VIII RELIGIOUS LIFE
- What is religious life?
It is the development of the spirit, after which it unites with the other spiritual beings similar or superior to it, and with God.
- Does the spirit achieve a completely religious life straight away?
No, but by degrees.
- What are these degrees?
They are: 1. Getting out of the mire of Hyle; 2. The purgative life; 3. The illuminating life; 4. The unifying life.
- What do you mean by getting out of the mire of Hyle?
I mean the resolution taken by man to give up the sensual, hylic or material life, in order to live henceforth that of the spirit, and the effort that he makes to do so.
- What do you mean by the purgative life?
I mean the life the spirit leads when, after having given up the hylic world, it receives the purifying mysteries.
- What do you mean by the illuminating life?
I mean the life the spirit leads when, in possession of purity, it makes the light within it shine more and more and it becomes worthy of returning to the realm of light.
- What to you mean by the unifying life?
I mean the life which the spirit leads when, having found its completion, its perfection, it has become united with God.
- What do the various degrees of religious life on earth represent?
They represent in a very imperfect way the religious development of our spirits across the universe and in the process of time.
- Does not the purgative life sometimes continue after death?
Yes; for spirits which, having become purified, still leave earth with some impurities, there is a purgative life outside the earth. That is what is called the state of PURGATORY.
- What does the state of purgatory consist of?
It consists of working against what is left of sensual obsession, which could take more or less time, and of a slow purging of the whole person.
- Why does the purgative life predominate on earth?
Because the men who inhabit it have committed sin and because they thus need purifying mysteries.