To some, the Catholic doctrine of purgatory is murky and mysterious—even scary. What is this shadowy state between earth and heaven supposed to be? Others wonder how it’s even possible for saved souls to be suffering in the afterlife if Jesus has already redeemed them.

No wonder that non-Christians imagine purgatory in sensationalistic ways and Protestants condemn it as an “unbiblical tradition of men.”

In Purgatory Is for Real, Catholic apologist Karlo Broussard (Meeting the Protestant Challenge) definitively tackles this most-misunderstood teaching, giving you the evidence and arguments to see (and explain to others) that purgatory is neither contrary to Scripture nor some fantastical dogma that Rome invented. Rather, it is firmly rooted in biblical truth and the faith and practice of the earliest Christians.

Even more importantly, Karlo shows that purgatory is not a cause for dread but a hopeful, even joyful sign of God’s love for us. It is a great consolation, a call for all Christians to pursue deeper holiness, and an opportunity to build loving solidarity with those who have gone before us.