Features and use of the eschatological notion of purgatory in Colombia

Abstract

The Reformation and Counter-Reformation transformed Christianity during modernity. In that transformation, the notion of purgatory remained a fundamental part of catholic eschatology. It was transmitted to the Spanish colonies through the process of evangelization and maintained with the establishment of the authority of the Catholic Church. In Colombia, the appropriation of purgatory followed the generalities of the Roman Catholic tradition. Like other eschatological notions of punishment; such appropriation was related with educational processes and political debates, until the trends of secularization limit its usefulness in the public sphere. Based on an analytic-descriptive methodology, and the use of primary and secondary sources, the present article aims to present the dogmatic generalities of purgatory, as well as the features of its appropriation and use in Colombia at the end of the nineteenth century and the first decades of the twentieth century.