Purgatory and the Importance of the Successor of Peter in the Church

Last year I accessed and read a book titled "Purgatory: The Logic of Total Transformation" published by Oxford University and authored by Jerry L. Walls, a Protestant theologian.  After reading the book,  I wrote a review on Amazon.com which you can see here: 
http://www.amazon.com/Purgatory-The-Logic-Total-Transformation/product-reviews/0199732299/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending

In my review, I said "This is a magnificent exposition to the historical development of the doctrine of Purgatory treated by a contemporary theologian from the Reformation tradition. I am sure that this pioneer work is encouraging to the minds of Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant theologians to assess what I see as a definite convergence on this important doctrine. Doctor Walls has shown that justification by grace does not excluded the process of sanctification of the person. In an ecumenical approach Walls does not exclude from the possibility of salvation those who have not accepted Christ (in another word, according to Vatican II, those who following the dictates of their conscience did not receive the Gospel of Christ). This is a much welcome proposition keeping in mind the great Christian tradition that salvation is possible only through Jesus Christ. This book is another step in the theological ecumenical work under development for over 50 years. I hope that Christian Churches and Communions will assess it favourably and move forward to restore their full visible unity."

A couple of days ago, M. Frost, a former Catholic and for 35 years to-date an Orthodox Christian commented on my comment about the well-written book. Although most reviewers of the book, mainly from the Protestant tradition, found the book quite remarkable, M. Frost chose to denounce the doctrine of Purgatory as an innovation by the Roman Catholic Church defined, according to him, after the Great Schism following the first 1,000 years of Christianity. In his opinion, if the Church needed to define any traditional dogma she would have defined it in the first 1,000 years. This is absurd as it says that the Church can never develop  beyond the first 1,000 years and denies to her the continued inspiration of the Holy Spirit. You can read all his arguments in the same link as above. But to me, he misunderstands a basic concept in Catholic doctrine, i.e. the development of doctrine, promulgated in Vatican II. In my reply, I attempted to emphasize the common heritage yet explain to him my understanding "Orthodox Christians share with Catholics 99% of the dogmatic definitions even though the Orthodox did not probably develop them beyond the mystical sense. Veneration of saints is not worship which is reserved to God. As far as I understand it, the definition of Purgatory in the Catholic Church entails a state and not a particular place. Anyone who passes away in the grace of God will see God eventually. I personally interpret Purgatory as the state of the person who dies in the grace of God, yet needs God's mercy and abundant love because he did not perfectly live the love of God in his earthly life, so he misses God and wants to be with God. But since he is not perfectly pure, he is in the state of being purified until perfectly able to be in the state of union with God in heaven. The Church did not stop growing in understanding the truth with the first 1,000 years but continues to develop and learn too in new ways."  And more so I emphasized "In all of your responses, you are exaggerating the differences between Catholics and Orthodox. Purgatory has never been a real issue of disagreement as shown in the documents of the Council of Florence signed by the Ecumenical Patriarch. Some Reformation theologies, which the Orthodox Church of Constantinople rejected, exaggerated the indulgence issues as a reaction to the Roman Catholic clergy's abuse of their power in order to build churches. But anyway, Martin Luther reportedly never wished to separate himself from the Catholic Church. He thought of reforming the Church but the way he did it was controversial since he allied himself with princes who opposed any temporal loyalty to the Holy See of Rome. There are, in fact, much larger challenges to all Churches than debating such little differences. The most important challenges today can be summarized in materialist atheism, totalitarianism, secularism, extreme capitalism, and fundamentalism that rejects any moderate freedom of expression to other faiths. When dealing with the question of God, we must start with man. I must recommend a few Catholic theologians for reading if you wish to understand Catholic Tradition: Yves Congar, Henri de Lubac, Karl Rahner, and Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI). To simplify matters, you will understand Catholic doctrine if you study the idea of the development of doctrine enshrined in Vatican II. Contrary to liberal interpretations, the Church does not revise the doctrines of faith, but only perceives them more deeply as she grows and moves forward in time until the end." 

On the issue of Christian unity, I said to him and must tell you, that the Ancient Oriental Orthodox Churches (Coptic Orthodox, Syrian Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, Ethiopian Orthodox...etc.) and the Greek Orthodox Churches (Orthodox Patriarchates and major metropolitan bishops of Constantinople, Antioch, Russia, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Greece...etc.) arrived at a full agreement on all doctrines since 1989. However, for some reason, both families of Orthodoxy have not yet ratified the agreements into real communion. Although we hope that they do come into full communion, it seems they need a sign of unity at the center that serves to maintain the unity of the global Church and act as an arbitration judge in matters of differences in expounding the doctrines of faith and morals among sister Churches. This is precisely the role of the Successor of St. Peter, the Bishop of Rome as has been the case since the 2nd century, and hence the Petrine Primacy is necessary.

In today's world of violence on the one hand and post-modern confusion, Christians need more than ever the visible sign or center of their unity, namely the role of the  role of the Successor of St. Peter, the Bishop of Rome. If you cannot help in theological dialogue, at least in prayer for Christian unity.