TREATISE ON PURGATORY by St. Catherine of Genoa
CHAPTER IX
THE WAY IN WHICH GOD AND THE SOULS REGARD ONE ANOTHER IN PURGATORY
THE SAINT CONFESSES HER INABILITY TO EXPRESS HERSELF ON THIS MATTER
All the things of which I have spoken, when compared with that of which I am assured in my intelligence, so far as I am able to comprehend it in this life, are of such intensity, that, by the side of them, all things seen, all things felt, all things imagined, all things just and true, seem to me lies and things of naught. I am confounded at my inability to find stronger words. I see that God is in such perfect conformity with the soul, that when He beholds it in the purity wherein it was created by His Divine Majesty, He imparts a certain attractive impulse of His burning love, enough to annihilate it, though it be immortal; and in this way so transforms the soul into Himself, its God, that it sees in itself nothing but God, who goes on thus attracting and in flaming it, until He has brought it to that state of existence whence it came forth that is, the spotless purity wherein it was created. And when the soul, by interior illumination, perceives that God is drawing it with such loving ardour to Himself, straightway there springs up within it a corresponding fire of love for its most sweet Lord and God, which causes it wholly to melt away: it sees in the Divine light how considerately, and with what unfailing providence, God is ever leading it to its full perfection, and that He does it all through pure love; it finds itself stopped by sin, and unable to follow the heavenly attraction, I mean that look which God casts on it to bring it into union with Himself: and this sense of the grievousness of being kept from beholding the Divine light, coupled with that instinctive longing which would fain be without hindrance to follow the enticing look, these two things, I say, make up the pains of the souls in purgatory. Not that they think anything of their pains, however great they be; they think far more of the opposition they are making to the will of God, which they see clearly is burning intensely with pure love to them. God meanwhile goes on drawing the soul to Himself by His looks of love mightily, and, as it were, with undivided energy: this the soul knows well; and could it find another purgatory greater than this by which it could sooner remove so great an obstacle, it would immediately plunge therein, impelled by that conforming love which is between God and the soul.
Reflection
In this life we see things, we know things, darkly as if through a mirror (cf. 1 Cor 13:12). When we perceive an object with our eyes, what we see is the illumination of the object by light – the reflected light from the object. If we change the colour of the light, how we understand the object changes. If the light is light of wavelength beyond what our eyes can see, then, even though the light is shining on the object, we do not see the object. Thus, it is important to understand the light by which an object is illuminated, for the information contained in the light – it being full-spectrum light, or blue light, or light waves that are beyond our capacity for seeing, or the degree of luminosity – all impact what we know and comprehend of an object. As such, what we comprehend of an object by sight is not the full reality of the object but an understanding truncated by the information in the light reflected by the object and truncated by the eye’s ability to perceive what is reflected.
What we comprehend by sight is a very large amount of information, even as it is itself a truncation of the reality of the object. This information can be then communicated to others by language, which is a truncation of information, even as language itself is rich and pregnant with meaning. This rock is blue. This rock is cobalt blue. This rock is CoAl2O4. Even that last doesn’t fully convey the object in question precisely because it has not been seen and what the hearer (or reader) has in their head is only a collection of recollections of other rocks in various blues, all similar to but not this rock that is blue. The difficulty in comprehension and communication only gets greater when the object in question is a thing that one has no prior knowledge by which to interpret what is seen and/or there is no prior knowledge by which to interpret that which is communicated. This is what we mean by when we say words fail me.
We see objects with the eye by the light reflected. The degree to which we see, know by sight, is the degree of soundness to the eye, the degree to which we engage in the act of seeing, and the degree to which light reflects off of objects to be seen. The more we engage in the act of seeing things, the more we have the ability to understand new things (by recollection, analysis, allegory, synthesis, etc. of memories of prior things) that we see, the more we do this, the less our words fail and the more we can communicate to others.
We see and know spiritual things with faith’s eye by means of the light of faith. The degree to which we know by faith is the degree of purity (soundness) of one’s heart, the degree to which we engage in acts of faith, and the degree to which God illumines the object of faith by the light of faith. The more we engage in the act of perceiving things in faith, the more we have the ability to understand new things (by recollection, analysis, allegory, synthesis, etc. of memories of prior things) that we see by faith, the more we do this, the less our words fail and the more we can communicate to others. This is why it is important to communicate the things of God and that the Missionary Mandate exists for those who have faith – out of basic justice to our fellow men so that they too might see and know the things of faith and not have their words fail them; that they might not be blind and dumb but healed.
Like an object seen by light, we do not truly know the object of faith directly but only in a truncated fashion. Therefore, we know imperfectly, act imperfectly, and communicate imperfectly. On the other side of this life, there is no body, no eye, there is no faith. The object of faith is now seen directly face to Face; we see God as He sees Himself, and as such, all other objects as God sees them. His very nature is the means and end of how we know other objects as well as the object of ourselves. Any imperfection in the soul that sees God directly is, at the same time, enough to cause infinite separation between the soul and God, and infinite pain in a rational soul in knowing this separation. This is enough to undo the creature, to “melt it away”. There is no truncated fashion in which or by which God is known for what is seen and known of God is what He sees and knows of Himself.
Contemplation
Question: Faith isn’t successive leaps in darkness, rather it is the act of opening one’s eyes and really, truly seeing. What are concrete acts of faith that we can do daily to open the eyes of our hearts in order to better see, know, and communicate to others the objects of faith?
Question: We see the pains and sufferings of this life as things that are ours; whether they be ours because we suffer them, or we are owed them, or that we must endure them. Essentially, that we are put upon. The imperfect souls see their imperfects as opposition to God’s will – they are the author of the separation, not God. God is rather the author of their union. When we suffer, how can we better stop the navel-gazing at our pain, and instead look in faith and hope to the God that is uniting Himself with us?
— PPP