Condemnation and Purgatory
In October 1936, Sister Faustina had a mysterious experience of hell: " I, Sister Faustina, by the order of God, have visited the abysses of hell so that I might tell souls about it and testify to its existence." (Diary 741).
Although she presented seven kinds of terrible tortures that the rejected suffer there, the message she summed up her experience is about our earthly situation: “But I noticed one thing: that most of the souls there are those who disbelieved that there is a hell. When I came to, I could hardly recover from the fright. How terribly souls suffer there! Consequently, I pray even more fervently for the conversion of sinners. I incessantly plead God’s mercy upon them.
O my Jesus, I would rather be in agony until the end of the world, amidst the greatest sufferings, than offend You by the least sin."(Diary 741).
Particularly very moving is the third part of this message: Faustina did not even think about the fact that she must do everything so that she would not go to hell. Above all, she was terrified that she might one day offend God with even a small sin - and to prevent it, she would rather, even to the end of the world, suffer hellish torture.
At least in two places, the Diary seems to have the hope of universal salvation. Around mid-1933 Faustina was visited by a recently deceased nun: " I saw her in a terrible condition, all in flames with her face painfully distorted. This lasted only a short time, and then she disappeared. A shudder went through my soul because I did not know whether she was suffering in purgatory or in hell. Nevertheless, I redoubled my prayers for her. The next night she came again, but I saw her in an even more horrible state, in the midst of flames which were even more intense, and despair was written all over her face. I was astonished to see her in a worse condition after the prayers I had offered for her, and I asked, haven’t my prayers helped you? She answered that my prayers had not helped her and that nothing would help her."
(Dairy 58).
Faustina, although she would have the right to guess that the unfortunate soul was in hell, she decided to pray for her even more strongly. She says this about it: " I replied,
if my prayers are not helping you, Sister, please stop coming to me. She disappeared at once. Despite this, I kept on praying. After some time she came back again to me during the night, but already her appearance had changed. There were no longer any flames, as there had been before, and her face was radiant, her eyes beaming with joy. She told me that I had a true love for my neighbor and that many other souls had profited from my prayers. She urged me not to cease praying for the souls in purgatory, and she added that she herself would not remain there much longer." (Diary 58)
Over three years later, Sister Faustina dared, immediately after Holy Communion, turn to Jesus with the following request: “Jesus, I beg You, by the inconceivable power of Your mercy, that all the souls who will die today escape the fire of hell, even if they have been the greatest sinners. Today is Friday, the memorial of Your bitter agony on the Cross; because Your mercy is inconceivable, the Angels will not be surprised at this. Jesus pressed me to His Heart and said, My beloved daughter, you have come to know well the depths of My Mercy. I will do what you ask but unite yourself continually with My agonizing Heart and make reparation to My justice. Know that you have asked Me for a great thing, but I see that this was dictated by your pure love for Me; that is why I am complying with your requests"(Dairy 873).
Assuming that this was not a phantom, but an authentic vision, the possibility of extrapolation arises: Since it was possible to save all people who left this world at a certain time, one can think that it is also possible to save all people at all. Of course, it would be a misuse to claim that Saint Faustina had the hope of universal salvation. There is no doubt, however, that the salvation of all sinners without exception was a deep desire of her heart and that she tried to do everything possible so that all sinners would be saved.
The Diary also contains entries about purgatory punishment. One of it deserves to be noted, although strictly speaking, it refers tothe severe suffering that Faustina herself went through. Admittedly, as a twenty-year-old postulant, she learned from the souls in Purgatory that " their greatest torment was longing for God" (Diary 20) - Saint Catherine of Genoa has said the same - the experience, however, which she experienced a few years later, spontaneously brings to mind the suffering of Purgatory and perhaps reflects its very essence. It consists in the unimaginably intense desire of God and at the same time an extremely painful sense of rejection. She described her experience in very moving words: " The soul, engulfed in darkness, moans in the midst of these torments and, despite all this, thirsts for God as burning lips thirst for water. It dies and withers; it dies a death without death; that is to say, it cannot die. All its efforts come to nothing; it is under a powerful hand. Now the soul comes under the power of the Just One. Al exterior temptations cease; all that surrounds it becomes silent, like a dying person who loses contact with everything around it; the person’s entire soul is in the hand of the Just God, the Thrice-Holy God, -rejected for all eternity! This is the culminating moment, and God alone can test a soul in this way, because He alone knows what the soul can endure. When the soul has been saturated through and through by this infernal fire, it is, as it were, cast headlong into great despair."(Diary 101).
Saint Faustina continues description of her purgatory on earth: “I no longer had the physical strength. I uttered my last words: “I trust in Your Mercy!” – and it seemed to me that I provoked God to an even greater anger. And now I was drowned in despair, and all that was left me was a moan of unadulterated pain which, from time to time, tore itself from my soul. The soul is in agony –and it seemed to me that I would remain in this state, because by my own strength I could not emerge from it. Every recollection of God opened up an unspeakable ocean of suffering, and yet despite this there is something within the soul which is drawn to Him, though it seems to her for this only –that she suffers more. The memory of the love with which God formerly surrounded it is still another kind of suffering. His gaze pierces it, and everything within the soul is burned by this gaze” (Diary 101)
If the gift of purgatory consists in the possibility of killing old self within ourselves, even if it would happen after leaving this world, it seems that the suffering of purgatory is just that.
fr. george