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NEWS 17 September 1999
Quit smoking for the fast track to Heaven
Pope supports those who give up pleasures of addiction, writes Richard Owen
The Vatican has stepped into the heated debate over smoking by suggesting that
those who give it up stand a better chance of going to Heaven.
The anti-smoking injunction, contained in a new list of "indulgences"
to be published today in time for the new millennium, applies particularly to
those who refrain from smoking in public places such as an office. However,
officials said that all those who "mortify the flesh" by forgoing a
pleasure or addiction such as smoking or drinking alcohol would be "doing a
partial penance that will help to purify them and prepare them for the
afterlife".
Giving up smoking is classed as a partial indulgence, which becomes a plenary or
full indulgence if accompanied by confession and Communion. The ruling is likely
to cause dismay in many parts of the Roman Catholic world, not least in Latin
America, where most of the world's billion or so Catholics live, and in Italy
itself, where modern notions of political correctness have made few inroads.
Smoking is almost obligatory in Italy.
There is no record of the Pope smoking, even as a young man in Poland, where he
otherwise mixed with his peers, acted in a drama group, went to the cinema and
played football. Jerzy Kruger, who knew the Pope in his youth, said many of
their circle smoked but the future Pope "steered clear of such
transgressions". He even chaired the local church abstinence society, which
advocated no smoking and no alcohol for young people.
One parish priest in Rome yesterday admitted that he smoked: "Although not
in front of my congregation. I try to set an example." He said that smoking
was not, strictly speaking, a sin but giving it up was "an act of
mortification, like not eating meat on Fridays, only more painful".
Monsignor Crescenzio Sepe, head of the Vatican millennium committee, said that
those who stopped smoking should donate the money they saved to charity.The new
list of indulgences, officially entitled the Enchiridion Indulgentiarum, updates
guidelines laid down by Pope Paul VI in 1968. It offers an indulgence for those
who "testify to their faith in public", for example by praying in
front of office colleagues or making the sign of the Cross in the workplace.
Other acts approved of as good for the soul are visiting the sick, dedicating
some free time to socially useful activity, and helping the poor and
disadvantaged. There is special provision for the blind, who can earn a partial
indulgence by li!
stening to sacred texts on an audio tape supplied by the Vatican.
The practice of granting indulgences began at the end of the 11th century, when
Pope Urban II offered them to those taking part in the First Crusade. In the
Middle Ages believers could gain remission of sins through pilgrimages, fasting
or a self-imposed discipline such as the wearing of a hair-shirt or
self-flagellation. The practice degenerated as indulgences were given for
political reasons or for gifts and money. Their sale infuriated Martin Luther,
who called them "pious frauds for the faithful", and the Protestant
abhorrence of the practice was one of the mainsprings of the Reformation.
www.vatican.va/
Official Vatican website
