INDULGENCE

It was a Sunday mornig and as usuall Angel, my elder brother’s wife would come to the house with her two lovely children Queen 3years n David 17months and we would all spend the day together.
It has always been the so and we loved to spend the Sunday together so on this particular Sunday Angel was telling my sister and I how she started to read the bible to her little ones before they go to bed and how the little ones loved it that they would be the ones to call their mother to read them the bible before they went to bed.
I encouraged her to continue with that wonderful act believing that some day those children will be the ones to read to their mother especially as they were bright and doing well in school.
Again I told them that Pope Leo XIII granted to the faithful who shall read for at least a quarter of an hour the books of the Sacred Scriptures with the veneration due to the Divine Word and as spiritual reading, an indulgence of 300 days.
Then came the question from my sister “What is an indungence” I explained to her the little I have read and have been taught about indulgence, its meaning and the conditions one can be in other to gain an indulgence, only the much I know I told them.
Again I realized how the average Catholic youth does not know or is ignorant of the treasury possessed by the Church which Jesus has granted to St. Peter so I went further to read about indulgence and what better place could I seek such information than the Catholic Encyclopedia http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07783a.htm.
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, An indulgence is the extra-sacramental remission of the temporal punishment due, in God's justice, to sin that has been forgiven, which remission is granted by the Church in the exercise of the power of the keys, through the application of the superabundant merits of Christ and of the saints, and for some just and reasonable motive.
In granting an indulgence, the grantor (pope or bishop) does not offer his personal merits in lieu of what God demands from the sinner. He acts in his official capacity as having jurisdiction in the Church, from whose spiritual treasury he draws the means wherewith payment is to be made. The Church herself is not the absolute owner, but simply the administratrix, of the superabundant merits which that treasury contains. In applying them, she keeps in view both the design of God's mercy and the demands of God's justice. She therefore determines the amount of each concession, as well as the conditions which the penitent must fulfill if he would gain the indulgence.

Various kinds of indulgences
By a plenary indulgence is meant the remission of the entire temporal punishment due to sin so that no further expiation is required in Purgatory. A partial indulgence commutes only a certain portion of the penalty; and this portion is determined in accordance with the penitential discipline of the early Church.

Dispositions necessary to gain an indulgence
The mere fact that the Church proclaims an indulgence does not imply that it can be gained without effort on the part of the faithful. From what has been said above, it is clear that the recipient must be free from the guilt of mortal sin. Furthermore, for plenary indulgences, confession and Communion are usually required, while for partial indulgences, though confession is not obligatory, the formula corde saltem contrito, i.e. "at least with a contrite heart", is the customary prescription.

Authoritative teaching of the Church
The Council of Trent (Sess, XXV, 3-4, Dec., 1563) declared: "Since the power of granting indulgences has been given to the Church by Christ, and since the Church from the earliest times has made use of this Divinely given power, the holy synod teaches and ordains that the use of indulgences, as most salutary to Christians and as approved by the authority of the councils, shall be retained in the Church; and it further pronounces anathema against those who either declare that indulgences are useless or deny that the Church has the power to grant them (Enchridion, 989). It is therefore of faith (de fide)
• that the Church has received from Christ the power to grant indulgences, and
• that the use of indulgences is salutary for the faithful.


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