Angels in Heaven’s reward resides in plain delivering

On Christmas Eve 1945, in Bedford Falls, New York, George Bailey is suicidal. Prayers for him reach Heaven, where Clarence Odbody, Angel 2nd Class, is assigned to save George in order to earn his angel wings.
(It’s a wonderful life plot, Wikipedia)

I should say this contains theological incorrectness.

An angel, i.e. a creature that is in Heaven, has already reached its final form. There is no more modification once you enter Heaven.

A creature can gain merit only before death. After it dies, it cannot gain merit anymore.

Those who are in Purgatory do experience modification. In fact, at the end of their Purgatory time, they are finally ready to enter Heaven.

What is important to underline, though, is that any modification a Purgatory soul goes through is possible not because of merit gaining, but because of pain suffering.
Tha’s because merit gaining ends with life. Merit gaining is not possible after death.

So, whatever Purgatory souls do for those on earth, they won’t get an ounce of merit for it.

But they still experience modification and evolution. We know this because we know that eventually they enter Heaven.

But they attain this, it must be clear, only through pain suffering.
It's a passive undertaking, not an active endeavour.

Therefore, it should be allowed to say that it is not possible to keep It's a Wonderful Life story correct, from a theological viewpoint, even if it was stated that Clarence Odbody is a Purgatory’s soul.

Simply, it’s not a theological reality that angels can have career advancement.
Heaven is fixed and stable. There’s nothing more fixed than Heaven.

So, even though the movie can be great, I can’t avoid saying that its premise is theologically incorrect.

But I guess it would have been less funny to simply say that God ordered Clarence Odbody, the angel, to perform a task, without any reward.