PURGATORY AND HOLY COMMUNION: CATHOLIC ANSWERS TO “REV.” CHRIS OKOTIE

by Jonathan Ekene Ifeanyi

"Rev." Chris Okotie

I read with a keen interest “Rev.” Chris Okotie’s statement that Pope Francis is an Anti Christ and that Catholics will go to hell. I got to know about this through an article I read on page 5 of Hallmark newspaper, published on December 4, 2013, entitled: "Okotie Under Fire Over Comments on Catholics." In the article, Chris Okotie is said to have also attacked Catholic belief in purgatory, as well as Holy Eucharist, or Holy Communion—and this, rather than his other comments, was what attracted my attention. Catholic churchmen who were quoted in the article to have responded to the comments were Monsignor Bernard Okodua and Monsignor Gabriel Osu. I was disappointed, however, that instead of using this rare opportunity to educate millions of confused Catholics and the general public particularly on two doctrinal issues raised by the heretic, these churchmen were not even talking like Catholics, let alone defending anything! The work they failed to do is therefore what I have undertaken to do here.

"All Catholics in the world will go to hell because they worship Satan and are led by an Anti Christ Pope who is a friend to the devil," Nigerian heretic, Chris Okotie, told his congregation on Sunday, leaving members bewildered.

Okotie, while preaching in his Household of God “church” in Ikeja area of Lagos on Sunday, said the Catholic Church is “a counterfeit church set up by Satan” and that Catholics “bow to idols, and crucify Jesus every Sunday when they eat bread claiming they are eating Jesus’ body.”

“Pastor” Okotie stressed: “They are not Christians and have never been. They don’t know Jesus. They believe that when they eat bread on Sundays, they are eating the body of Jesus. It’s a ritual.”

“They don’t believe in heaven. They believe in purgatory, the purgatory that they invented,” Okotie said.

According to PM News, Okotie said Pope Francis is an Anti-Christ who does the job of the devil and that time is fast approaching when the Catholic Church will pledge allegiance to Satan.

“The pope is an Anti-Christ and the Catholic Church will soon declare for Satan. This is the end of times.”

He advised members of his “church” to come to the rescue of Catholics and evangelise them. This, he said, was not out of disrespect but “out of respect for the word of God.”

He said those who know the truth should bring it to those who do not know it in the Catholic Church.

Okotie said one of the Catholic most revered Popes, Pope John Paul 11, surrendered the Catholic Church to Mary, the earthly mother of Jesus Christ, instead of Jesus himself. He said even the current Pope Francis has also done the same.

He said Catholics are not Christians and do not worship the same Christ that he preaches in his “church”, at least the one spoken about in the Bible.

Okotie said he did not write the Bible but it was clear to him that those in the Catholic church were lost and were heading to hell fire.

“That church, the Catholic church has been there for Satan and at the right time, they will declare for Satan,” Okotie said.

It is really interesting to note that recent popes have been going against Catholic doctrine by teaching that Protestants are Christians and will be saved. But here, in Chris Okotie, we see a typical Protestant in action, telling us what Protestantism is really all about, that is, ardent, Satanic hatred of the Catholic Church! And what true Protestants really believe—all Catholics will go to hell!

The errors of these popes had started since the 1960s, precisely dating from the Masonic Second Vatican Council. Their major heresy is that Protestants are Christians just as Catholics are. These errors were mostly promoted by John Paul II who in his teachings encouraged Protestants to remain separated from Catholics, whereas Jesus Christ, in the Holy Scriptures, prayed for the unity of all Christians under one head, the pope (cf. John 17:5, 11, 20-21). John Paul II even went to the extent of teaching that all world religions—Protestantism, Islam, Buddhism, etc., can save, thus contradicting Jesus’ statement that: “I am the door. By Me, if any man enters in, he shall be saved” (John 10: 9); and again: “…but whoever refuses to believe is condemned already, because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son”(John 3:18). In Nigeria, we can see Catholic Bishops promoting this heresy by belonging to the heretical “Christian Association of Nigeria,” as well as preaching an impossible ‘Dialogue with Islam’, a dialogue which even true Islam forbids. Anyone who wishes to know the difference between today’s pseudo-Catholic Church (which started from the 1960s) and the Catholic Church that has existed for over 2000 years should, to say the least, consult Pope Gregory XVI’s Encyclical Letter On Liberalism  (Mirari Vos, August 15, 1832), or Pope St Pius X’s Encyclical Letter On the “Sillon”, (August 25, 1910), which are currently on the internet.

The greatest challenge facing the Christian Church in today’s world is ignorance, and I mean, a massive one. Billions of people all over the world do not know the true history of Christianity and are not even interested to learn it, because we live in a world where religion, and in particular, the Christian Faith, has been relegated to the margins of influence. In Islam, we see men and women—young and old, intellectuals and innocents—burning with zeal to learn the doctrines of their religion, and they can do anything to promote and propagate these doctrines. When they enter the mosque to pray, they behave like real religious people. Their women—even the worst sinners among them—dress modestly, with the hairs well covered, and the men are equally excellent in their outward dispositions. But in today’s pseudo-Christianity, it is a completely sad story. Here, not only do those who claim to be Christ’s followers refuse to learn the true Christian doctrines and practices, they simply make a mockery of everything!

For instance, it is simply unknown that the Bible is, first and foremost, a Holy Book belonging solely to the Holy Catholic religion. The word “Bible” is derived through the medieval Latin from the Greek τὰ βύβλα (Ta Biblia), which simply means “the books.” “The Books” refer to a collection of 27 books written by Christ’s early followers in the second half of the first century. These books were initially different texts until they were collected and compiled, approved by Pope Boniface in the year 419 and thenceforth became known as a holy book, the Holy Bible. To say the least, no “Christian” can really understand the words of the Bible until he or she becomes a Catholic, and I mean, a faithful one.

Now on purgatory: Protestants, like Okotie and his group, teach that the word “purgatory” is nowhere in the Bible and therefore is purely a Catholic fabrication. They are completely wrong. It is true that the word “purgatory” is nowhere in the Bible, but this does not mean that the concept is not there. In fact, there are many other words commonly used today even by Protestants which are nowhere in the Bible. For instance, many of the Protestants “believe” in the “Trinity”, in the “Incarnation” and in the “Bible.” But these words are nowhere in the Bible! Have the Protestants considered the fact that even the word “Bible” is nowhere in the Bible? Do they know that this word, just like the word “purgatory,” is one of those words “fabricated” by the Catholic Church?

The words “Bible,” “Pope,” “Purgatory,” “Trinity,” etc., were coined by the Catholic Church. They are nowhere in the Bible but their concepts are perfectly there. In the Bible, they are referred to by other names. The Bible, for example, is referred to as “scripture.” The Pope is referred to as the “Rock” of the Church or as the “Shepherd” (Cf. Matt. 16:17-19; John 10: 16; 21: 15-17), and so on.

The word “purgatory” is derived from the Latin “purgatio,” which means purging or justification. The infinitive “purgare,” means “to cleanse, purge, clear away; to exculpate, justify; to purify.” Purgatory is a place where souls that have venial sins suffer for a time after the death or are purified in order to go to heaven. Protestants teach that after death souls will either go to heaven or to hell. They are completely wrong. In fact, this teaching is purely Satanic because it contradicts the Bible. Logically, to say that souls after death will either go to heaven or to hell implies that no one will go to heaven at all, because hardly do men die without at least venial sins. Protestants do not believe in the concept of venial or mortal sins which are clearly written in the Bible. The Bible teaches that there are sins that lead to death and sins that do not lead to death, as we read in First John (chapter 5: 16 17): “If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, let him ask, and life shall be given to him, who sinneth not to death. There is a sin which leads to death. I do not say you should ask for that. All iniquity is sin. And there is a sin leading to death.” This passage is so badly translated in so many Protestant and false Catholic bibles, therefore I have carefully translated the above verse from the original Greek.

This sin which "leads to death," that is, to hell, is what the Catholic Church refers to as mortal sin, while the sin which "does not lead to death," that is, does not lead to hell, is what She refers to as venial sin. Let me illustrate: If an armed robber enters a man’s house, snatches his properties and shoots him to death, that is a mortal sin. If the armed robber does not repent and dies in this sin, he will go to hell. At the same time, if a man utters even the least bad words against his neighbour, like a mere gossip that cannot cause his neighbour any harm, that is a venial sin. If the man does not repent and dies in this “little” sin, he will go to purgatory, where he will suffer for a while—perhaps for 50 years or more than that—according to the gravity of his sin. He will not go to hell because his sin is not that serious, yet it is a sin and because of this, he must be purified from it before he can be admitted into heaven. He will be judged accordingly. This is what Our Lord meant when He said that the Son of Man “will reward each according to his works” (Matt. 16: 27).

Now it is against our common sense of reasoning to say that God, who is just, will give the same punishment to both the man who stole and killed his neighbour and the one who only uttered bad words against his neighbour. Yet, that is what Protestants teach!

Protestants also teach that all their members who believe in Christ will automatically go to heaven. But the truth is that most people, like the Protestants, always die in the state of mortal sins, and such people go to hell immediately. In fact, except by the special divine intervention, it is difficult to find souls who do not pass through purgatory but go to heaven straight-away, as Protestants teach, because it is difficult to see any human being who, at the moment of his or her death, has no sin at all. But why must souls pass through purgatory? It is because God decreed that nothing impure will enter into heaven, as we read: “There shall not enter into it anything defiled, or that worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they that are written in the book of life of the lamb” (Cf. Rev. 21: 27).

Purgatory is actually similar to hell-fire. Here souls burn in horrible flames of fire; but unlike souls in hell, they are only being purified from their venial sins and they have hope of being released in the future. We see St Paul talking about this purifying fire, this fire of purgatory in his First Letter to the Corinthian Christians: “If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire” (1 Corr. 3: 15). The original Greek reads: “εἴ τινος τὸ ἔργον κατακαήσεται, ζημιωθήσεται, αὐτὸς δὲ σωθήσεται, οὕτως δὲ ὡς διὰ πυρός” (1 Cor. 3: 15). The Greek “αὐτὸς δὲ σωθήσεται” means “he himself will be saved” and “οὕτως δὲ ὡς διὰ πυρός” means “yet so as through fire”. The word “πυρός” (pyros) means “fire”. Who are those St Paul is talking about here, who will be saved through fire? What fire is he talking about?

No Protestant—not their keenest theologians—can answer the above questions accurately. Only the Catholic Church—the only Church founded by Christ Himself—has the answer.

The concept of praying for souls in purgatory is also in the Bible. We see this in the Book of Machabees (2 Mach. 12: 46), which reads: “It is, therefore, a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.” But I will not talk about this here because Protestants’ bible is incomplete and does not contain this book. Protestants’ bible contains 66 books. The complete Bible remains the Catholic Bible, with 73 books.

Now on the Holy Eucharist: Protestants, like Okotie and his group, teach that “holy communion” received in their “churches” is not the body of Christ but its symbol. They, therefore, accuse Catholics who believe otherwise in their own Church of practising idolatry. Excellent!

But Christ, as we read in the Gospels, fed about five thousand men with five barley loaves and two small fish (John 6: 8-13). After performing this miracle the people believed that He was truly the prophet who was to come into the world and sought to take Him by force and make Him a king, but Jesus perceived this and departed to a mountain, where He stayed alone (John 6:14-15). The Jews then began to seek Him, and when eventually they found Him, beside the sea, Jesus told them plainly:

"Most assuredly I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not labour for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him" (John 26-27).

The people then asked Him, ‘‘What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?’’ Jesus answered and said to them: ‘‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent’’. Then, the same people, whom He had earlier fed with the five barley loaves and two small fish, began to demand a sign from heaven before they could believe in Him. ‘‘What sign will You perform then, that we may see it and believe You?’’ they asked. ‘‘What work will You do? Our fathers ate the manner in the desert; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat’ ’’ (John. 28-31). Christ then said to them: ‘‘Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world’ ’’(John.32-33). The people said to Him, ‘‘Lord, give us this bread’’ and Jesus replied: ‘‘I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and He who believes in Me shall never thirst.’’

This statement should be carefully noted: Protestants hold that the Eucharist is a symbol of the body of Christ, but here Jesus contradicts them. He says “I am the bread of life”, not “I am the symbol of bread”! The Jews, like the Protestants, then complained against Him because of these words, that is, because He said ‘‘I am the bread which came down from heaven’’. They said: ‘‘Is not this Jesus, the Son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He says, ‘I have come down from heaven?’’(John 6: 34-35; 41-42). We read, from verse 43 to 58:

“Jesus therefore answered and said to them, ‘‘Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God’. Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me. Not that anyone has seen the Father, except He who is from God; He has seen the Father. Most assuredly I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manner in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.

“The Jews, therefore, quarrelled among themselves, saying, ‘‘How can this Man give us His flesh to eat’’. Then Jesus said to them, ‘‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down from heaven—not as your fathers ate the manner, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.”

The above doctrine, properly taught and practised only by the Catholic Church, is the major difference between Catholicism and other so-called Christian denominations. The Jews could not understand the doctrine, but Jesus was blunt in letting them know that it was essential for their salvation. Like them, Protestants do not believe that the Eucharist is actually the true body and blood of Christ. For them, to say so is pure madness! St Paul, indeed, seems to be addressing the following questions to them: ‘‘The cup of blessing we bless, is it not fellowship in the Blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not fellowship in the Body of Christ?’’ (1 Cor. 10:16). St Paul’s questions show that, right from the earliest days of the Church, the doctrine had been a matter of dispute even as it is today.

The English word ‘‘Eucharist’’ is from the Greek ἡ εὐχᾷριστία (Eucharistia), which simply means ‘‘thankfulness’’ or ‘‘gratitude’’. The breaking of bread comes from a well-attested Jewish usage, namely, the religious gesture of the head of the table at the beginning of every meal taken in common. The more recent name, Eucharist, is based on the same custom; the head of the table, before distributing the bread, pronounced a blessing—beraskah—a word whose New Testament equivalent is as much eulogia as eucharistia (cf. Mark 8: 6-7).

‘‘The Eucharist is the food which came down from heaven in the eschatological person of the Son of Man made flesh,’’ writes J. Delorme, OP. ‘‘Having come down from heaven and returned to heaven He can now give His flesh and blood as food, in the Church’’. The Eucharist is the central rite of the Christian religion, in which the bread and wine are consecrated by an ordained priest, and consumed by the priest and members of the congregation in obedience to the Lord’s command, ‘‘Do this in remembrance of Me’’(Luke 22:19).

There are seven sacraments in the Catholic Church. After baptism, the Eucharist is the next indispensable sacrament of the Church without which salvation cannot be possible. As the Lord Himself stated above: ‘‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you’’. It is only in the Catholic Church that this flesh of the Son of Man can be eaten, and nowhere else. In fact, Protestants themselves admit that what they eat in their “churches” is not the true flesh of Christ but its symbol. The true flesh is being eaten only in the Catholic Church, and nowhere else!

My dear Chris Okotie, I have done this little research for your sake, for your salvation! But on the Catholic use of images, I decided not to make any comment on that but to leave you in your ignorance for now. However, if you write to thank me for what I have done for you here, I will be pleased to do that for you and many others again. May God bless you!

Source: This piece was first published by eaglereporters.com in 2013.

 Related: 

• NIGERIAN “PASTORS” AND THEIR PROSPERITY “GOSPEL”

•  Genesis 3:15: “He shall crush thy head” or “She shall crush thy head”?