52 Quotes About Purgatory

Politics is the art of promising heaven and delivering purgatory, and claiming hero status for saving your country from hell.

what would I do without this world faceless incuriouswhere to be lasts but an instant where every instantspills in the void the ignorance of having beenwhat would I do what I did yesterday and the day beforepeering out of my deadlight looking for anotherwandering like me eddying far from all the living in a convulsive spaceamong the voices voicelessthat throng my hiddenness

[on Purgatory] It is, of course, open to anyone to say that the whole idea is morbid and exaggerated--open even to those who think nothing of queuing for twenty-four hours in acute discomfort to see the first night of a musical comedy, which lasts three hours at most, which they are not sure of liking when they get there, and which they could see any other night with no trouble at all.

Perhaps that’s all that purgatory is—prolonged death throes.

The myth of purgatory is an allegory, a projection, from the present on to the future. This is why purgatory appeals to the imagination. It is our story. It is where we are now. If we are Christians, if we believe in the risen Jesus as Lord, if we are baptized members of his body, then we are passing right now through the sufferings which form the gateway to life.

Because I have this theory that when we die, every animal that we've eaten has a chance at eating us back. So if you're a carnivore and you add up all the animals you've eaten - well, that's a long time in purgatory, being chewed

Maybe Manhattan is purgatory.

God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform, as Reenie used to say. Could it be that Myra is my designated guardian angel? Or is she instead a foretaste of Purgatory? And how do you tell the difference?

To change her mind is a woman's prerogative, to change his mind is a man's purgatory.