Changes

: ''The truth has been divinely revealed that sins are followed by punishments. God's holiness and justice inflict them. Sins must be expiated. This may be done on this earth through the sorrows, miseries and trials of this life and, above all, through death. Otherwise the expiation must be made in the next life through fire and torments or purifying punishments.''

Writings about purgatory can be found from third century onward. The doctrine was established by [[Gregory the Great]] in 604. Belief in purgatory was widespread in the Middle Ages and Christians in this age were plagued with the fear of death because of it. However, at the [[Council of Florence]] in 1439 the Greek church declared that belief in purgatory was an irreconcilable differences between them and Rome. The existence of purgatory along with justification by faith plus works was denied by the Luther and the reformers in the sixteenth century and has never been part of the Protestant beliefs.