Question:
Is the Last Four Things a doctrine of the Church or a catechetical formula?
Answer:
“The Last Four Things” is simply a popular expression of the final things of human existence. The Last Four Things are death, judgment, heaven, hell.
Clearly, these are all things that the Church teaches and has doctrines regarding, but this popular general grouping is just that.
As the Catholic Encyclopedia notes in its entry on eschatology:
The eschatological summary which speaks of the “four last things” (death, judgment, heaven, and hell) is popular rather than scientific.
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