Once the doctrine of Purgatory was in place, it was only logical for the concept of indulgences to arise. These two errors reveal clearly the Roman Catholic legalistic preoccupation with earning salvation through good works rather than receiving it as a gift based on what Christ accomplished on our behalf.
The granting of indulgences to supposedly partially or fully remit our remaining debt to God in Purgatory is more closely aligned with Islam than Christianity.
The granting of indulgences was predicated on two beliefs. First, in the sacrament of penance it did not suffice to have the guilt (culpa) of sin forgiven through absolution alone; one also needed to undergo temporal punishment (poena, from p[o]enitentia, “penance”) because one had offended Almighty God. Second, indulgences rested on belief in purgatory, a place in the next life where one could continue to cancel the accumulated debt of one’s sins, another Western medieval conception not shared by Eastern Orthodoxy or other Eastern Christian churches not recognizing the primacy of the pope. 1
The Roman church strayed from the simple forgiveness offered in the gospel to more complicated and religious forms of public penance required by bishops for serious sins.
Some sins apparently resulted in permanent excommunication. Nowhere in the teachings of Jesus or the apostles in the New Testament can we find anything like that. Roman Catholic doctrine insisted that Christ’s death and resurrection needed something more to be added to it. We know from Scripture that this is not so.
I know that everything God does will remain forever; there is nothing to add to it and there is nothing to take from it, for God has so worked that men should fear Him. Ecclesiastes 3:14 (NASB95)
Believing that Christ’s work was imperfect is a grave error that detracts from his glory. What Jesus accomplished on the cross was perfect, complete, and good for all time.
but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, SAT DOWN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, 13 waiting from that time onward UNTIL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE A FOOTSTOOL FOR HIS FEET. 14 For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. Hebrews 10:12–14 (NASB95)
…Scholastic theologians of the 12th and 13th centuries worked out a fully articulated theory of penance. It consisted of three parts: contrition, confession, and satisfaction. The debt of forgiven sin could be reduced through the performance of good works in this life (pilgrimages, charitable acts, and the like) or through suffering in purgatory. Indulgences could be granted only by popes or, to a lesser extent, archbishops and bishops as ways of helping ordinary people measure and amortize their remaining debt. “Plenary,” or full, indulgences cancelled all the existing obligation, while “partial” indulgences remitted only a portion of it. People naturally wanted to know how much debt was forgiven (just as modern students want to know exactly what they need to study for examinations), so set periods of days, months, and years came gradually to be attached to different kinds of partial indulgences.
One did not, however, have to do it all by oneself. Medieval Christianity was a vast community of mutual help through prayer and good works, uniting the living and the dead in the Church Militant on earth, the Church Suffering in purgatory, and the Church Triumphant in heaven. The good works of Jesus Christ, the saints, and others could be drawn upon to liberate souls from purgatory. In 1343 Pope Clement VI decreed that all these good works were in the Treasury of Merit, over which the pope had control.
This highly complicated theological system, which was framed as a means to help people achieve their eternal salvation, easily lent itself to misunderstanding and abuse as early as the 13th century, much sooner than is usually thought. A principal contributing factor was money. Paralleling the rise of indulgences, the Crusades, and the reforming papacy was the economic resurgence of Europe that began in the 11th century. Part of this tremendous upsurge was the phenomenon of commutation, through which any services, obligations, or goods could be converted into a corresponding monetary payment. Those eager to gain plenary indulgences, but unable to go on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, wondered whether they might perform an alternative good work or make an equivalent offering to a charitable enterprise—for example, the building of a leprosarium or a cathedral. Churchmen allowed such commutation, and the popes even encouraged it, especially Innocent III (reigned 1198–1216) in his various Crusading projects. From the 12th century onward the process of salvation was therefore increasingly bound up with money. Reformers of the 14th and 15th centuries frequently complained about the “sale” of indulgences by pardoners.
People also wondered whether they could gain an indulgence for someone who had died and was presumed to be in purgatory. If so, in acting out of charity for someone else, were they then obliged to confess their own sins, as they would if they sought to obtain an indulgence for themselves? Although these concerns were surfacing as early as the 13th century, it was only in 1476 that Pope Sixtus IV declared that one could indeed gain an indulgence for someone in purgatory. 2
This brings us to the time of the reformer Martin Luther, who posted his “95 Theses” or points of debate on the church door in Wittenburg, Germany on October 31, 1517. At that time, a Dominican friar named Johann Tetzel sold indulgences to raise money for the pope by claiming: “When a penny in the coffer rings, / A soul from Purgatory springs.” Luther challenged the entire system of indulgences by simply asking why the pope, if he had control over the treasury of merit, did not simply release everyone from Purgatory out of love, instead of requiring monetary payment.
As should be apparent, the RCC’s theology of penance is contrary to the New Covenant which teaches unequivocally that Christ’s sacrifice perfectly atoned from our sins.
The concept that Christ only removed guilt but did not perfectly cleanse us from unrighteousness is also wrong. John wrote that the opposite is true.
If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9 (NASB95)
Paul made it clear that no “work” can be added to what Christ did for us without our forfeiting grace altogether. Anything we try to “do” to gain merit with God is a work of the law.
It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery. 2 Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. 3 And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law. 4 You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. Galatians 5:1–4 (NASB95)
One can justifiably insert indulgence or penance in the place of circumcision in the above passage. Anything we insist is necessary over and above faith in Christ is a work of the law.
The doctrines of Purgatory and indulgences teach that Christ did not actually save us. He simply made it possible for us to save ourselves via good works. This is not the gospel. It is a man-made religion that stands in opposition to the New Covenant.
1 https://www.britannica.com/topic/indulgence
2 Ibid.