Eternal Rest or Requiem aeternam is a Western Christian prayer asking God:
98-532: (1) to hasten the progression of the souls of the faithful departed in Purgatory to their place in Heaven (in Catholicism) (2) to rest in the love of God the souls of the faithful departed in Paradise until the resurrection of the dead and Last Judgement (in Catholicism, Lutheranism, Anglicanism and Methodism) The prayer is cited from 2 Esdras (4 Esdras Vulgate): Therefore, I say to you, O nations that hear and understand, “Wait for your shepherd; he will give you everlasting rest, because he who will come at
196-412: A postmortem examination or an obduction , is a medical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a human corpse to determine the cause and manner of a person's death and to evaluate any disease or injury that may be present. It is usually performed by a specialized medical doctor called a pathologist . Autopsies are either performed for legal or medical purposes. A forensic autopsy
294-558: A coma. In the case of sleep, electroencephalograms (EEGs) are used to tell the difference. The category of "brain death" is seen as problematic by some scholars. For instance, Dr. Franklin Miller, a senior faculty member at the Department of Bioethics, National Institutes of Health, notes: "By the late 1990s... the equation of brain death with death of the human being was increasingly challenged by scholars, based on evidence regarding
392-409: A concept of an afterlife that may hold the idea of judgment of good and bad deeds in one's life. There are also different customs for honoring the body, such as a funeral , cremation , or sky burial . After a death, an obituary may be posted in a newspaper, and the "survived by" kin and friends usually go through the grieving process . The concept of death is the key to human understanding of
490-446: A definition of the moment of death is required, doctors and coroners usually turn to "brain death" or "biological death" to define a person as being dead; people are considered dead when the electrical activity in their brain ceases. It is presumed that an end of electrical activity indicates the end of consciousness . Suspension of consciousness must be permanent and not transient, as occurs during certain sleep stages, and especially
588-748: A flame, love itself cleanses it from the residue of sin." In his 2007 encyclical Spe salvi , Pope Benedict XVI, referring to the words of Paul the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 3:12–15 about a fire that both burns and saves, spoke of the opinion that "the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in
686-533: A full remission of sin and punishment – and go to Heaven. According to the doctrine of the Catholic Church, those who die in God's grace and friendship imperfectly purified, although they are assured of their eternal salvation, undergo a purification after death, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of God . Unless "redeemed by repentance and God's forgiveness", mortal sin , whose object
784-434: A gradual and probably painful process. It can be advanced during life by voluntary self-mortification and penance and by deeds of generosity that show love of God rather than of creatures. If not completed before death, it can still be needed for entering the divine presence. A person seeking purification from sinful tendencies is not alone. Because of the communion of saints : "the holiness of one profits others, well beyond
882-687: A joyful or marvelous final relinquishment of worldly attachments (non-fiery purgatory). The Eastern Orthodox churches have somewhat different formulations of an intermediate state. Most Protestant denominations do not endorse the Catholic formulation. Several other religions have concepts resembling Purgatory: Gehenna in Judaism , al-A'raf or the upper most layer of hell in Islam , Naraka in Hinduism . The word "purgatory" has come to refer to
980-425: A living being can survive all calamities but eventually dies due to causes relating to old age. Conversely, premature death can refer to a death that occurs before old age arrives, for example, human death before a person reaches the age of 75. Animal and plant cells normally reproduce and function during the whole period of natural existence, but the aging process derives from the deterioration of cellular activity and
1078-456: A place. Purgatory pre-dates the specific Catholic tradition of purgatory as a transitional state or condition; it has a history that dates back before Christ, to related beliefs also in Judaism, that prayer for the dead contributes to their afterlife purification. The same practice appears in other traditions, such as the medieval Chinese Buddhist practice of making offerings on behalf of
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#17327930962421176-401: A previous miscarriage, and the use of abortion can increase the chances of having a miscarriage. An abortion may be performed for many reasons, such as pregnancy from rape , financial constraints of having a child, teenage pregnancy , and the lack of support from a significant other . There are two forms of abortion: a medical abortion and an in-clinic abortion or sometimes referred to as
1274-562: A soul. A common analogy is dross being removed from gold in a furnace. In Catholic doctrine , purgatory refers to the final cleansing of those who died in the State of Grace, and leaves in them only "the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven"; it is entirely different from the punishment of the damned and is not related to the forgiveness of sins for salvation. A forgiven person can be freed from his "unhealthy attachment to creatures" by fervent charity in this world, and otherwise by
1372-402: A surgical abortion. A medical abortion involves taking a pill that will terminate the pregnancy no more than 11 weeks past the last period , and an in-clinic abortion involves a medical procedure using suction to empty the uterus; this is possible after 12 weeks, but it may be more difficult to find an operating doctor who will go through with the procedure. Senescence refers to a scenario when
1470-441: A vegetative state or coma, in that the former situation describes a state that is beyond recovery. EEGs can detect spurious electrical impulses, while certain drugs, hypoglycemia , hypoxia , or hypothermia can suppress or even stop brain activity temporarily; because of this, hospitals have protocols for determining brain death involving EEGs at widely separated intervals under defined conditions. People maintaining that only
1568-503: A wide range of historical and modern conceptions of postmortem suffering short of everlasting damnation. English-speakers also use the word analogously to mean any place or condition of suffering or torment, especially one that is temporary. The noun "Purgatory" (in Latin purgatorium , a place of cleansing, from the verb purgo , "to clean, cleanse" ) appeared perhaps only between 1160 and 1180, which encouraged speaking of Purgatory as
1666-456: Is aging , followed by cardiovascular disease , which is a disease that affects the heart or blood vessels . As of 2022, an estimated total of almost 110 billion humans have died, or roughly 94% of all humans to have ever lived. A substudy of gerontology known as biogerontology seeks to eliminate death by natural aging in humans, often through the application of natural processes found in certain organisms. However, as humans do not have
1764-549: Is a cleansing after death of the souls of the saved and that these are assisted by the prayers of the living: Death Death is the end of life ; the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain a living organism . The remains of a former organism normally begin to decompose shortly after death. Death eventually and inevitably occurs in all organisms. Some organisms, such as Turritopsis dohrnii , are biologically immortal ; however, they can still die from means other than aging . Death
1862-408: Is a finite supply presented at birth. Later, Goldstone proposed the concept of production or income of adaptation energy which may be stored (up to a limit) as a capital reserve of adaptation. In recent works, adaptation energy is considered an internal coordinate on the "dominant path" in the model of adaptation. It is demonstrated that oscillations of well-being appear when the reserve of adaptability
1960-568: Is a profound act of love addressed to a God of love". The Latin text in the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church is: ℣. Requiem æternam dona ei (eis), Domine ℟. Et lux perpetua luceat ei (eis): ℣. Requiescat (-ant) in pace. ℟. Amen. The translation used by English-speaking Catholics is: The translation used by English-speaking Lutherans is: The translation used by English-speaking Anglicans is: A variation of
2058-495: Is a summary in dialogue form of the Catechism of the Catholic Church . It deals with purgatory in the following exchange: 210. What is purgatory? 211. How can we help the souls being purified in purgatory? These two questions and answers summarize information in sections 1030–1032 and 1054 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church , published in 1992, which also speaks of purgatory in sections 1472−1473. The prayers of
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#17327930962422156-427: Is almost exhausted. In 2012, suicide overtook car crashes as the leading cause of human injury deaths in the U.S., followed by poisoning, falls, and murder. Accidents and disasters, from nuclear disasters to structural collapses , also claim lives. One of the deadliest incidents of all time is the 1975 Banqiao Dam Failure , with varying estimates, up to 240,000 dead. Other incidents with high death tolls are
2254-494: Is an irreversible process where someone loses their existence as a person. Historically, attempts to define the exact moment of a human's death have been subjective or imprecise. Death was defined as the cessation of heartbeat (cardiac arrest) and breathing , but the development of CPR and prompt defibrillation have rendered that definition inadequate because breathing and heartbeat can sometimes be restarted. This type of death where circulatory and respiratory arrest happens
2352-403: Is called the 'temporal punishment' of sin". "These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain." Joseph Ratzinger has paraphrased this as: "Purgatory
2450-501: Is carried out when the cause of death may be a criminal matter, while a clinical or academic autopsy is performed to find the medical cause of death and is used in cases of unknown or uncertain death, or for research purposes. Autopsies can be further classified into cases where external examination suffices, and those where the body is dissected and an internal examination is conducted. Permission from next of kin may be required for internal autopsy in some cases. Once an internal autopsy
2548-471: Is clear that we cannot calculate the 'duration' of this transforming burning in terms of the chronological measurements of this world. The transforming 'moment' of this encounter eludes earthly time-reckoning – it is the heart's time, it is the time of 'passage' to communion with God in the Body of Christ." The popular conceptions of Purgatory that, especially in late medieval times, were common among Catholics of
2646-438: Is complete the body is generally reconstituted by sewing it back together. A necropsy, which is not always a medical procedure, was a term previously used to describe an unregulated postmortem examination. In modern times, this term is more commonly associated with the corpses of animals. Death before birth can happen in several ways: stillbirth , when the fetus dies before or during the delivery process; miscarriage , when
2744-883: Is determined by the rate of aging for a species inherent in its genes . A recognized method of extending maximum lifespan is calorie restriction . Theoretically, the extension of the maximum lifespan can be achieved by reducing the rate of aging damage, by periodic replacement of damaged tissues , molecular repair , or rejuvenation of deteriorated cells and tissues. A United States poll found religious and irreligious people, as well as men and women and people of different economic classes, have similar rates of support for life extension, while Africans and Hispanics have higher rates of support than white people. 38% said they would desire to have their aging process cured. Researchers of life extension can be known as "biomedical gerontologists ." They try to understand aging, and develop treatments to reverse aging processes, or at least slow them for
2842-405: Is generally applied to whole organisms; the equivalent for individual components of an organism, such as cells or tissues , is necrosis . Something that is not considered an organism, such as a virus , can be physically destroyed but is not said to die , as a virus is not considered alive in the first place. As of the early 21st century, 56 million people die per year. The most common reason
2940-419: Is grave matter and is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent, "causes exclusion from Christ's kingdom and the eternal death of hell, for our freedom has the power to make choices for ever, with no turning back." Such sin "makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the 'eternal punishment' of sin". Venial sin , while not depriving the sinner of friendship with God or
3038-481: Is known as the circulatory definition of death (CDD). Proponents of the CDD believe this definition is reasonable because a person with permanent loss of circulatory and respiratory function should be considered dead. Critics of this definition state that while cessation of these functions may be permanent, it does not mean the situation is irreversible because if CPR is applied fast enough, the person could be revived. Thus,
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3136-406: Is more of a process than a single event. It implies a slow shift from one spiritual state to another. Other definitions for death focus on the character of cessation of organismic functioning and human death, which refers to irreversible loss of personhood. More specifically, death occurs when a living entity experiences irreversible cessation of all functioning. As it pertains to human life, death
3234-481: Is not, as Tertullian thought, some kind of supra-worldly concentration camp where man is forced to undergo punishment in a more or less arbitrary fashion. Rather it is the inwardly necessary process of transformation in which a person becomes capable of Christ, capable of God, and thus capable of unity with the whole communion of saints". This purification from our sinful tendencies has been compared to rehabilitation of someone who needs to be cleansed of any addiction,
3332-669: Is now seen as a process, more than an event: conditions once considered indicative of death are now reversible. Where in the process, a dividing line is drawn between life and death depends on factors beyond the presence or absence of vital signs . In general, clinical death is neither necessary nor sufficient for a determination of legal death . A patient with working heart and lungs determined to be brain dead can be pronounced legally dead without clinical death occurring. Life extension refers to an increase in maximum or average lifespan , especially in humans, by slowing or reversing aging processes through anti-aging measures. Aging
3430-438: Is purgatory: an inner fire." He further said that: "'The soul', Catherine says, 'presents itself to God still bound to the desires and suffering that derive from sin and this makes it impossible for it to enjoy the beatific vision of God'.…The soul is aware of the immense love and perfect justice of God and consequently suffers for having failed to respond in a correct and perfect way to this love; and love for God itself becomes
3528-501: Is something humans share with cetaceans called the mammalian diving reflex . As medical technologies advance, ideas about when death occurs may have to be reevaluated in light of the ability to restore a person to vitality after longer periods of apparent death (as happened when CPR and defibrillation showed that cessation of heartbeat is inadequate as a decisive indicator of death). The lack of electrical brain activity may not be enough to consider someone scientifically dead. Therefore,
3626-483: Is the most common cause of death worldwide. Aging is seen as inevitable, so according to Aubrey de Grey little is spent on research into anti-aging therapies, a phenomenon known as pro-aging trance . The average lifespan is determined by vulnerability to accidents and age or lifestyle-related afflictions such as cancer or cardiovascular disease . Extension of lifespan can be achieved by good diet , exercise, and avoidance of hazards such as smoking . Maximum lifespan
3724-463: Is viewed as problematic by some scholars, there are proponents of it that believe this definition of death is the most reasonable for distinguishing life from death. The reasoning behind the support for this definition is that brain death has a set of criteria that is reliable and reproducible. Also, the brain is crucial in determining our identity or who we are as human beings. The distinction should be made that "brain death" cannot be equated with one in
3822-586: The 1931 China floods , which killed an estimated 4 million people, although estimates widely vary; the 1887 Yellow River flood , which killed an estimated 2 million people in China; and the 1970 Bhola cyclone , which killed as many as 500,000 people in Pakistan. If naturally occurring famines are considered natural disasters, the Chinese famine of 1906–1907 , which killed 15–20 million people, can be considered
3920-614: The Eastern Orthodox Church spoke at the council. The Council of Trent repeated the same two points and moreover in its 4 December 1563 Decree Concerning Purgatory recommended avoidance of speculations and non-essential questions: Let the more difficult and subtle "questions", however, and those which do not make for "edification" (cf. 1Tm 1,4), and from which there is very often no increase in piety, be excluded from popular discourses to uneducated people. Likewise, let them not permit uncertain matters, or those that have
4018-780: The Latin Church have not necessarily found acceptance in the Eastern Catholic Churches , of which there are 23 in full communion with the Pope. Some have explicitly rejected the notions of punishment by fire in a particular place that are prominent in the popular picture of Purgatory. The representatives of the Eastern Orthodox Church at the Council of Florence (1431–1449) argued against these notions, while declaring that they do hold that there
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4116-525: The Wanggongchang explosion (when a gunpowder factory ended up with 20,000 deaths), a collapse of a wall of Circus Maximus that killed 13,000 people, and the Chernobyl disaster that killed between 95 and 4,000 people. Natural disasters kill around 45,000 people annually, although this number can vary to millions to thousands on a per-decade basis. Some of the deadliest natural disasters are
4214-485: The embryo dies before independent survival; and abortion , the artificial termination of the pregnancy. Stillbirth and miscarriage can happen for various reasons, while abortion is carried out purposely. Stillbirth can happen right before or after the delivery of a fetus. It can result from defects of the fetus or risk factors present in the mother. Reductions of these factors, caesarean sections when risks are present, and early detection of birth defects have lowered
4312-454: The neo-cortex of the brain is necessary for consciousness sometimes argue that only electrical activity should be considered when defining death. Eventually, the criterion for death may be the permanent and irreversible loss of cognitive function, as evidenced by the death of the cerebral cortex . All hope of recovering human thought and personality is then gone, given current and foreseeable medical technology. Even by whole-brain criteria,
4410-426: The personality and identity are irretrievably lost, so therefore, the person should be considered entirely dead. Brain death is sometimes used as a legal definition of death. For all organisms with a brain, death can instead be focused on this organ. The cause of death is usually considered important and an autopsy can be done. There are many causes, from accidents to diseases. Many cultures and religions have
4508-453: The 20th century and could kill 1 billion people worldwide in the 21st century, a World Health Organization report warned. Many leading developed world causes of death can be postponed by diet and physical activity , but the accelerating incidence of disease with age still imposes limits on human longevity . The evolutionary cause of aging is, at best, only beginning to be understood. It has been suggested that direct intervention in
4606-402: The Catholic Church defined, for the first time, its teaching on purgatory, in summary two points: The council declared: [I]f they die truly repentant in charity before they have made satisfaction by worthy fruits of penance for (sins) committed and omitted, their souls are cleansed after death by purgatorical or purifying punishments, … And to relieve punishments of this kind, the offerings of
4704-512: The Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodox Churches , and elements of the Anglican , Lutheran , and Methodist traditions hold that for some there is cleansing after death and pray for the dead , knowing it to be efficacious. The Reformed Churches teach that the departed are delivered from their sins through the process of glorification . Rabbinical Judaism also believes in the possibility of after-death purification and may even use
4802-549: The Father of mercies the remission of the temporal punishments due for their sins". On the cusp of the Reformation, St Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510) re-framed the theology of purgatory as voluntary, loving and even joyful: "As for paradise, God has placed no doors there. Whoever wishes to enter, does so. An all-merciful God stands there with His arms open, waiting to receive us into His glory. I also see, however, that
4900-702: The President's Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research in 1980. They concluded that this approach to defining death sufficed in reaching a uniform definition nationwide. A multitude of reasons was presented to support this definition, including uniformity of standards in law for establishing death, consumption of a family's fiscal resources for artificial life support, and legal establishment for equating brain death with death to proceed with organ donation . Aside from
4998-542: The Purgatory of popular imagination, is also absent in the Catholic Church's doctrine. Purgatory and indulgences are defined (i.e. official Catholic) doctrines, unlike limbo . Catholicism bases its teaching also on the practice of praying for the dead, in use within the church ever since the church began, and mentioned in the deuterocanonical book 2 Maccabees 12:46 . At the Second Council of Lyon in 1274,
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#17327930962425096-550: The United Nations Special Reporter on the Right to Food, 2000 – Mar 2008, mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality rate in 2006. Ziegler says worldwide, approximately 62 million people died from all causes and of those deaths, more than 36 million died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients . Tobacco smoking killed 100 million people worldwide in
5194-404: The aging process may now be the most effective intervention against major causes of death. Selye proposed a unified non-specific approach to many causes of death. He demonstrated that stress decreases the adaptability of an organism and proposed to describe adaptability as a special resource, adaptation energy . The animal dies when this resource is exhausted. Selye assumed that adaptability
5292-540: The appearance of falsehood, to be brought out and discussed publicly. Those matters on the contrary, which tend to a certain curiosity or superstition, or that savor of filthy lucre, let them prohibit as scandals and stumbling blocks to the faithful. Catholic doctrine on purgatory is presented as composed of the same two points in the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church , first published in 2005, which
5390-444: The arguments for and against the CDD boil down to defining the actual words "permanent" and "irreversible," which further complicates the challenge of defining death. Furthermore, events causally linked to death in the past no longer kill in all circumstances; without a functioning heart or lungs, life can sometimes be sustained with a combination of life support devices, organ transplants , and artificial pacemakers . Today, where
5488-439: The array of biological functioning displayed by patients correctly diagnosed as having this condition who were maintained on mechanical ventilation for substantial periods of time. These patients maintained the ability to sustain circulation and respiration, control temperature, excrete wastes, heal wounds, fight infections and, most dramatically, to gestate fetuses (in the case of pregnant "brain-dead" women)." While "brain death"
5586-501: The brain must have completely ceased. However, in other jurisdictions, some follow the brainstem version of brain death. Afterward, a death certificate is issued in most jurisdictions, either by a doctor or by an administrative office, upon presentation of a doctor's declaration of death. There are many anecdotal references to people being declared dead by physicians and then "coming back to life," sometimes days later in their coffin or when embalming procedures are about to begin. From
5684-491: The church calls purgatory, "so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven ". Though in popular imagination Purgatory is pictured as a place rather than a process of purification, the idea of Purgatory as a physical place is not part of the church's doctrine. However, the church's understanding has typically been that purgatory has a temporal (temporary, terminating, non-eternal) component with only God being outside of time. Fire, another important element of
5782-471: The concept of information-theoretic death has been suggested as a better means of defining when true death occurs, though the concept has few practical applications outside the field of cryonics . The leading cause of human death in developing countries is infectious disease . The leading causes in developed countries are atherosclerosis ( heart disease and stroke), cancer, and other diseases related to obesity and aging . By an extremely wide margin,
5880-508: The dead was adopted by Christians from the beginning, a practice that presupposes that the dead are thereby assisted between death and their entry into their final abode. The New American Bible Revised Edition , authorized by the United States Catholic bishops, says in a note to the 2 Maccabees passage: "This is the earliest statement of the doctrine that prayers and sacrifices for the dead are efficacious. …The author…uses
5978-579: The dead, who are said to suffer numerous trials. The Catholic church found specific Old Testament support in after-life purification in 2 Maccabees 12:42–45, part of the Catholic , Eastern Orthodox , Oriental Orthodox and Church of the East biblical canons but regarded as apocryphal by Protestants and major branches of Judaism. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church , praying for
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#17327930962426076-427: The dead. Protestants usually do not recognize purgatory as such: following their doctrine of sola scriptura , they claim Jesus is not recorded mentioning or otherwise endorsing it, and the old-covenant work 2 Maccabees is not accepted by them as scripture. The Catholic Church holds that "all who die in God's grace and friendship but still imperfectly purified" undergo a process of purification after death, which
6174-714: The dead. The Lutheran cleric Richard Futrell wrote that "The historic practice within the Lutheran Church had prayers for the dead in their Prayer of the Church. For example, if we were to look at a typical Lutheran service during Luther’s lifetime, we would find in the Prayer of the Church not only intercessions, special prayers, and the Lord’s Prayer, which are still typical today in Lutheran worship, but also prayers for
6272-503: The dead." For those who have died, Martin Luther declared that 'I regard it as no sin to pray with free devotion in this or some similar fashion: Dear God, if this soul is in a condition accessible to mercy, be thou gracious to it. ( Luther’s Works , Volume 37) The United Methodist Church teaches the "truth of intercessory prayer for the dead" and that "prayer for the dead has been a widespread practice throughout Christian history [and]
6370-550: The deadliest natural disaster in recorded history. In animals, predation can be a common cause of death. Livestock have a 6% death rate from predation. However, younger animals are more susceptible to predation. For example, 50% of young foxes die to birds , bobcats , coyotes , and other foxes as well. Young bear cubs in the Yellowstone National Park only have a 40% chance to survive to adulthood from other bears and predators. An autopsy, also known as
6468-556: The determination of brain death can be complicated. At present, in most places, the more conservative definition of death (irreversible cessation of electrical activity in the whole brain, as opposed to just in the neo-cortex) has been adopted. One example is the Uniform Determination Of Death Act in the United States. In the past, the adoption of this whole-brain definition was a conclusion of
6566-512: The divine presence is so pure and light-filled – much more than we can imagine – that the soul that has but the slightest imperfection would rather throw itself into a thousand hells than appear thus before the divine presence." So purgatory is a state of both joy and voluntary pain: Again the soul perceives the grievousness of being held back from seeing the divine light; the soul’s instinct too, being drawn by that uniting look, craves to be unhindered” Pope Benedict XVI recommended to theologians
6664-676: The doctrine. The council made no mention of purgatory as a third place or as containing fire, which are absent also in the declarations by the Councils of Florence (1431–1449) and of Trent (1545–1563). Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI have written that the term does not indicate a place, but a condition of existence. The Church of England , mother church of the Anglican Communion , officially denounces what it calls "the Romish Doctrine concerning Purgatory", but
6762-439: The end of the age is close at hand. Be ready for the rewards of the kingdom, because perpetual light will shine on you forevermore. -2 Esdras 2:34-35 NRSV This Catholic doctrine is found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 1030-1032 : All who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve
6860-407: The end of the twelfth century Purgatory started to be represented as a physical place, Le Goff states that the concept involves the idea of a purgatorial fire, which he suggests "is expiatory and purifying not punitive like hell fire". At the Second Council of Lyon in 1274, when the Catholic Church defined, for the first time, its teaching on purgatory, the Eastern Orthodox Church did not adopt
6958-439: The eternal happiness of heaven, "weakens charity, manifests a disordered affection for created goods, and impedes the soul's progress in the exercise of the virtues and the practice of the moral good; it merits temporal punishment", for "every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth, or after death in the state called purgatory. This purification frees one from what
7056-439: The figure to be closer to 800. In cases of electric shock , cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for an hour or longer can allow stunned nerves to recover, allowing an apparently dead person to survive. People found unconscious under icy water may survive if their faces are kept continuously cold until they arrive at an emergency room . This "diving response," in which metabolic activity and oxygen requirements are minimal,
7154-434: The flaws in this approach is that there are many organisms that are alive but probably not conscious. Another problem is in defining consciousness, which has many different definitions given by modern scientists, psychologists and philosophers. Additionally, many religious traditions, including Abrahamic and Dharmic traditions, hold that death does not (or may not) entail the end of consciousness. In certain cultures, death
7252-417: The harm that the sin of one could cause others. Thus recourse to the communion of saints lets the contrite sinner be more promptly and efficaciously purified of the punishments for sin". The Catholic Church states that, through the granting of indulgences for manifestations of devotion, penance and charity by the living, it opens for individuals "the treasury of the merits of Christ and the saints to obtain from
7350-406: The heartbeat ceased, a status still known as clinical death . However, the development of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) meant that such a state was no longer strictly irreversible. Brain death was then considered a more fitting option, but several definitions exist for this. Some people believe that all brain functions must cease. Others believe that even if the brainstem is still alive,
7448-560: The holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned...From the beginning the Church has honoured the memory of the dead and offered prayers in suffrage for them, above all the Eucharistic sacrifice , so that, thus purified, they may attain the beatific vision of God. The Church also commends almsgiving, indulgences, and works of penance undertaken on behalf of
7546-483: The issue of support of or dispute against brain death, there is another inherent problem in this categorical definition: the variability of its application in medical practice. In 1995, the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) established the criteria that became the medical standard for diagnosing neurologic death. At that time, three clinical features had to be satisfied to determine "irreversible cessation" of
7644-551: The jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii , the hydra , and the planarian . Unnatural causes of death include suicide and predation . Of all causes, roughly 150,000 people die around the world each day. Of these, two-thirds die directly or indirectly due to senescence, but in industrialized countries – such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany – the rate approaches 90% (i.e., nearly nine out of ten of all deaths are related to senescence). Physiological death
7742-467: The joy of your home not made with hands but eternal in the heavens; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. In the Catholic Church there was an indulgence of 300 days for each performance. The indulgence can also be made in favor of the souls in Purgatory. Purgatory Purgatory ( Latin : purgatorium , borrowed into English via Anglo-Norman and Old French ) is a passing intermediate state after physical death for purifying or purging
7840-476: The largest unifying cause of death in the developed world is biological aging, leading to various complications known as aging-associated diseases . These conditions cause loss of homeostasis , leading to cardiac arrest, causing loss of oxygen and nutrient supply, causing irreversible deterioration of the brain and other tissues . Of the roughly 150,000 people who die each day across the globe, about two thirds die of age-related causes. In industrialized nations,
7938-552: The living faithful are of advantage to these, namely, the sacrifices of Masses, prayers, alms , and other duties of piety, which have customarily been performed by the faithful for the other faithful according to the regulations of the Church. A century and a half later, the Council of Florence repeated the same two points in practically the same words, again excluding certain elements of the purgatory of popular imagination, in particular fire and place, against which representatives of
8036-431: The means to apply this to themselves, they have to use other ways to reach the maximum lifespan for a human, often through lifestyle changes, such as calorie reduction , dieting , and exercise . The idea of lifespan extension is considered and studied as a way for people to live longer. Determining when a person has definitively died has proven difficult. Initially, death was defined as occurring when breathing and
8134-583: The mid-18th century onwards, there was an upsurge in the public's fear of being mistakenly buried alive and much debate about the uncertainty of the signs of death. Various suggestions were made to test for signs of life before burial, ranging from pouring vinegar and pepper into the corpse's mouth to applying red hot pokers to the feet or into the rectum . Writing in 1895, the physician J.C. Ouseley claimed that as many as 2,700 people were buried prematurely each year in England and Wales, although some estimates peg
8232-466: The moment when life ends. Determining when death has occurred is difficult, as cessation of life functions is often not simultaneous across organ systems. Such determination, therefore, requires drawing precise conceptual boundaries between life and death. This is difficult due to there being little consensus on how to define life. It is possible to define life in terms of consciousness. When consciousness ceases, an organism can be said to have died. One of
8330-399: The non-vindictive "temporal (i.e. non-eternal) punishment" of purgatory. In late medieval times, metaphors of time, place and fire were frequently adopted. Catherine of Genoa (fl. 1500) re-framed the idea as ultimately joyful. It has been portrayed in art as an unpleasant (voluntary but not optional) "punishment" for unregretted minor sins and imperfect contrition (fiery purgatory) or as
8428-447: The other hand, believe that the rule does not uphold the best interests of the donors and that the rule does not effectively promote organ donation. Signs of death or strong indications that a warm-blooded animal is no longer alive are: The stages that follow after death are: The death of a person has legal consequences that may vary between jurisdictions. Most countries follow the whole-brain death criteria, where all functions of
8526-506: The pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation 'as through fire'. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God. The pain of love becomes our salvation and our joy. In his 2007 encyclical Spe salvi , Pope Benedict XVI teaches: It
8624-420: The phenomenon. There are many scientific approaches and various interpretations of the concept. Additionally, the advent of life-sustaining therapy and the numerous criteria for defining death from both a medical and legal standpoint have made it difficult to create a single unifying definition. One of the challenges in defining death is in distinguishing it from life. As a point in time, death seems to refer to
8722-625: The prayer said by American Methodist clergy during A Service of Death and Resurrection is: Eternal God, we praise you for the great company of all those who have finished their course in faith and now rest from their labor. We praise you for those dear to us whom we name in our hearts before you. Especially we praise you for Name, whom you have graciously received into your presence. To all of these, grant your peace. Let perpetual light shine upon them; and help us so to believe where we have not seen, that your presence may lead us through our years, and bring us at last with them into
8820-401: The presentation of purgatory by Catherine of Genoa, for whom purgatory is not an external but an inner fire: "In her day it was depicted mainly using images linked to space: a certain space was conceived of in which Purgatory was supposed to be located. Catherine, however, did not see purgatory as a scene in the bowels of the earth: for her it is not an exterior but rather an interior fire. This
8918-628: The proportion is much higher, approaching 90%. With improved medical capability, dying has become a condition to be managed . In developing nations , inferior sanitary conditions and lack of access to modern medical technology make death from infectious diseases more common than in developed countries . One such disease is tuberculosis , a bacterial disease that killed 1.8 million people in 2015. In 2004, malaria caused about 2.7 million deaths annually. The AIDS death toll in Africa may reach 90–100 million by 2025. According to Jean Ziegler ,
9016-673: The rate of stillbirth. However, 1% of births in the United States end in a stillbirth. A miscarriage is defined by the World Health Organization as, "The expulsion or extraction from its mother of an embryo or fetus weighing 500g or less." Miscarriage is one of the most frequent problems in pregnancy, and is reported in around 12–15% of all clinical pregnancies ; however, by including pregnancy losses during menstruation , it could be up to 17–22% of all pregnancies. There are many risk-factors involved in miscarriage; consumption of caffeine , tobacco , alcohol , drugs, having
9114-722: The ruination of regular functioning. The aptitude of cells for gradual deterioration and mortality means that cells are naturally sentenced to stable and long-term loss of living capacities, even despite continuing metabolic reactions and viability. In the United Kingdom, for example, nine out of ten of all the deaths that occur daily relates to senescence, while around the world, it accounts for two-thirds of 150,000 deaths that take place daily. Almost all animals who survive external hazards to their biological functioning eventually die from biological aging , known in life sciences as "senescence." Some organisms experience negligible senescence , even exhibiting biological immortality . These include
9212-433: The rule: there must be an official declaration of death in a person before starting organ procurement, or that organ procurement cannot result in the death of the donor. A great deal of controversy has surrounded the definition of death and the dead donor rule. Advocates of the rule believe that the rule is legitimate in protecting organ donors while also countering any moral or legal objection to organ procurement. Critics, on
9310-547: The saints in Heaven and the good deeds, works of mercy , prayers, and indulgences of the living have a twofold effect: they help the souls in purgatory atone for their sins and they make the souls' own prayers for the living effective, since the merits of the saints in Heaven, on Earth, and in Purgatory are part of the treasury of merit . Whenever the Eucharist is celebrated, souls in Purgatory are purified – i.e., they receive
9408-487: The story to demonstrate belief in the resurrection of the just, and in the possibility of expiation for the sins of otherwise good people who have died. This belief is similar to, but not quite the same as, the Catholic doctrine of purgatory." Sacred Tradition , by reference to certain texts of scripture , speaks of the process as involving a cleansing fire. According to Jacques Le Goff , in Western Europe toward
9506-414: The total brain, including coma with clear etiology, cessation of breathing, and lack of brainstem reflexes. These criteria were updated again, most recently in 2010, but substantial discrepancies remain across hospitals and medical specialties. The problem of defining death is especially imperative as it pertains to the dead donor rule , which could be understood as one of the following interpretations of
9604-424: The word "purgatory" to describe the similar rabbinical concept of Gehenna , though Gehenna is also sometimes described as more similar to hell or Hades . Some Christians, typically Roman Catholics , recognize the doctrine of purgatory. The Eastern Orthodox are less likely to use the term, although they acknowledge an intermediate state after death and before final judgment, and consequentially offer prayers for
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