As Catholics, we look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the renewal of all things when Christ comes again in glory. But what of those who have died? Do they also await these things, or have they in some sense already happened for them?
Traditionally, the Church has answered this question in terms of the souls of human beings experiencing either beatitude (immediately or after purification) or perdition – the resurrection of the body and the transfiguration of the cosmos being events that are distinct and deferred in relation to this state.
