St. Catherine of Genoa: Treatise on Purgatory

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CHAPTER X. HOW GOD MAKES USE OF PURGATORY TO RENDER THE SOUL PERFECTLY PURE;
THE SOUL THERE ATTAINS SUCH PURITY, THAT WERE IT TO STAY AFTER BEING CLEANSED IT WOULD NO LONGER SUFFER.


Again, I see that the love of God directs towards the soul certain burning rays and shafts of light, which seem penetrating and powerful enough to annihilate not merely the body, but, were it possible, the very soul itself. These work in two ways; they purify, and they annihilate.

Look at gold: the more it is melted, the better it becomes; and it could be melted so as to destroy every single defect. Such is the action of fire on material things. Now the soul cannot be annihilated so far as it is in God, but only in itself; and the more it is purified, so much the more it annihilates self, till at last it becomes quite pure and rests in God. Gold which has been purified to a certain point ceases to suffer any diminution from the action of fire, however great it be; for the fire does not destroy gold, but only the dross that it may chance to have.

In like manner the Divine fire acts on souls: God holds them in the furnace until every defect has been burnt away, and He has brought them, each in his own degree, to a certain standard of perfection. Thus purified, they rest in God without any alloy of self: their very being is God; they become impassible because there is nothing left to be consumed. And if in this state of purity they were kept in the fire, they would feel no pain; rather it would be to them a fire of Divine Love, burning on without opposition, like the fire of life eternal.

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CHAPTER XI. THE DESIRE OF THE SOULS IN PURGATORY TO BE QUITE FREE FROM THE STAINS OF THEIR SINS — THE WISDOM OF GOD IN SUDDENLY HIDING FROM THOSE SOULS THE DEFECTS THEY HAVE.


The soul in its creation was invested with all the conditions of which it was capable for reaching perfection, supposing it to live according to the appointment of God, and keep altogether from the defilements of sin. But, marred by original sin, it loses all its gifts and graces, becomes dead; and God alone can raise it to life again. And when He has done so by baptism, still the propensity to evil remains, which, if unresisted, inclines and leads to actual sin, whereby the soul again dies. Again God restores it to life; but after this it is so tainted, so turned to self, that to recall it to its first state needs all that Divine agency that I have been speaking about, without which it never could be recalled. And when the soul finds itself on its way back to that first state, it is so enkindled with the desire of becoming one with God, that this desire becomes its purgatory; not that the soul can look at purgatory as such, but the instinct by which it is kindled, and the impediment by which it is hindered, constitute its purgatory.

God performs this last act of love without the co-operation of man; for there are so many secret imperfections within the soul, that the sight of them would drive it to despair. These are, however, all destroyed during the process I have described; and when they are consumed, God shows them to the soul, that it may understand that it was He who kindled that fire of love which consumes every imperfection there is to be consumed.

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CHAPTER XII. THE UNION OF SUFFERING AND JOY IN PURGATORY.


Know that what man deems perfection is in the sight of God a defect. All the things which have the appearance of perfection, so far as they come before the sight, the feeling, the understanding, the memory, or the will, are tainted and spoilt if not recognised as from God. For a work to be perfect, it must be wrought in us, without our co-operation as principal agents; it must be God's work, done in God, and man must not in any way take the lead. Such precisely is that operation of His pure and simple love which God finally works in us, without any merit of our own; wherein he so penetrates and burns the soul, that the surrounding body is consumed away, and can no more hold up, than one could remain alive and rest patiently amid the flames of a burning fiery furnace. It is true that the overflowing love of God bestows upon the souls in purgatory a happiness beyond expression great: but then this happiness does not in the least diminish the pain — rather the pain is constituted by this love finding itself impeded; the more perfect the love of which God makes the soul capable, the greater the pain.

In this manner the souls in purgatory at the same time experience the greatest happiness and the most excessive pain; and one does not prevent the other.

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CHAPTER XIII. HOW THE SOUL, RECOGNISING ITS OWN IMPERFECTION, RUSHES OF ITSELF INTO PURGATORY.


God created the soul to enjoy the fruition of Himself, for which end He endowed it with such a powerful instinct, that, were it to find anything it has done to be contrary to its fulfilment, it would instantly chastise and correct it by its own good will, without waiting for any other judgment.

I will explain myself by a comparison. Suppose that on the day of judgment every one were to be freed from his sins by the blood of Christ, yet some blemishes and deformities were left in the soul through sin: such, for instance, as a shortness of sight, preventing one from beholding the divine light, or contracted limbs, causing one to walk and to work imperfectly, with many other similar defects; all of which would be discovered in that clear light. Now, if such a soul were placed before the face of God, it would feel that it could not bear that presence, it would feel the contrast between what it is and what it ought to be; and so, that self-love which God infuses into it as part of its creation would of itself be a hell to it, or rather would put it into purgatory for its own purification, without any other judge or sentence.

The soul sees by the divine light how disfigured it is, and, urged by that natural instinct which God has planted in it for the purpose of keeping it pure, understands full well that only by some such purging can it restore itself to the purity in which God designed it. It accordingly chastises itself in purgatory, without any external compulsion whatsoever. The soul, that is to say, creates its own purgatory by its own act of love; not that the soul was damned, but the soul was not fit to be in heaven; and the soul, out of love for God and desire for the divine union, accepts this purgatory.

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Chapter XIV. On the Submission to the Will of God That the Souls in Purgatory Have.


These souls are so closely united, so transformed into the will of God, that in all things they are satisfied with His most holy decree; and were a soul presented before God with ever so little to purge away, it would suffer grievous hurt and a torment worse than ten purgatories. That unspotted sanctity, that perfect justice, could not endure it; to do so would be unbecoming on the part of God. Should, then, the soul perceive that it lacked even a moment of satisfying God most completely, it would be to it a thing intolerable; and rather than stand thus imperfectly cleansed in the presence of God, it would plunge at once into a thousand hells.