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PURGATORY occupies an important place in our holy religion : it forms one of the principal parts of the work of Jesus Christ, and plays an essential role in the economy of the salvation of man. What then is the work which we, members of the Church, have to do for the souls in Purgatory ? We have to alleviate their sufferings. God has placed in our hands the key of this mysterious prison : it is prayer for the dead, devotion to the souls in Purgatory.

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As a Carmelite immersed in the contemplative spirituality of his order, Father John Welch writes from the lived experience of an interior life. The seventy short articles here under one cover were first published in Christ is our Hope, a monthly publication of the Catholic Diocese of Joliet focused on evangelizing and educating.

Between 1600 and 1800 around 4,000 Catholic women left England for a life of exile in the convents of France, Flanders, Portugal and America. These closed communities offered religious contemplation and safety, but also provided an environment of concentrated female intellectualism. The nuns’ writings from this time form a unique resource.