NV-Souls in Purgatory

NOVENA FOR THE HOLY SOULS IN PURGATORY
FEAST DAY : NOVEMBER 2nd

What is a Novena?
A novena is a traditional devotion consisting of specific prayers recited on nine successive days. Besides being a form of praise, a novena is frequently offered for a particular intention. The first novena took place in the Cenacle, during the nine days preceding Pentecost, or the coming of the Holy Ghost. As a regular popular custom, this practice began in 12th century Christianity and continues to be beneficial today as a way of praying for healing, protection or other blessings for ourselves or others.

This particular novena is prayed to God to benefit the Poor Holy Souls in Purgatory, who suffer far beyond what we can comprehend, yet also suffer with a joy that we cannot comprehend due to those great sufferings. The Poor Holy Souls are destined for Heaven, but failed to reach the perfection required of them while living here on Earth. Now, in the fires of Purgatory, they are unable to alleviate their sufferings—they must rely upon the charity of others to reduce their pains and hasten the hour of their deliverance from Purgatory and entrance into Heaven. Let us be among those charitable souls who help them!

In praying this Novena, as in the case of all prayer, it is good to begin by opening ourselves wholeheartedly to God's will, offering a simple act of trust in God's wisdom and in His providential love for us all, that disposes all things for the ultimate benefit of our souls and their salvation.

How to Pray This Novena
This novena is based on our ultimate goal, which is to reach God in Heaven. Each day of the novena is divided into the following parts: (1) a quote from the Treatise on Purgatory by St. Catherine of Genoa (2) a passage from the book Purgatory Explained by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.; (3) a Meditation; (4) a Prayer; (5) after mentioning your intention, pray the Our Father and the Hail Mary; (6) a Closing Prayer.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us. Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.

God the Father of Heaven,
Have mercy on the souls of the faithful departed.
God the Son, Redeemer of the world,
Have mercy on the souls of the faithful departed.
God the Holy Ghost,
Have mercy on the souls of the faithful departed.
Holy Trinity, One God,
Have mercy on the souls of the faithful departed.

Holy Mary,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Holy Mother of God,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of the Angels,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Mother of Mount Carmel,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Mother most Merciful,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Mother of Compassion,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Mother of Pity,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Fatima,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Lourdes,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of La Salette,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Ransom,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Guadalupe,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Quito,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Good Counsel,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of the Rosary,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Perpetual Help,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady, Help of Christians,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Mercy,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Clemency,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Tears,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.
Our Lady of Victories,
Intercede for the souls of the faithful departed.

Beg thy Son, to spare the souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, to deliver the souls in Purgatory from all pain,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, to deliver the souls in Purgatory from His just wrath,
We beseech Thee, O Mericiful Mother, hear us.

From the flames of fire, beg thy Son to deliver the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

From the region of the shadow of death, beg thy Son to deliver the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Through Thine Immaculate Conception, beg thy Son to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through the power of His Nativity, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through the power of His Most Holy Name, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through the multitude of His tender mercies, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through His most bitter Passion, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through His most Sacred Wounds, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through His most Precious Blood, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, through His ignominious death, by which He destroyed our death, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, Who didst absolve the sinner woman and hear the prayer of the good thief, to show mercy to the poor souls in Purgatory,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, to release our deceased parents, relations and benefactors from the bonds of their sins and the punishment due for them,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, to hasten the day of visiting His faithful departed soul, detained in the receptacles of sorrow, and to speedily transport them to the city of eternal peace,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Beg thy Son, to shorten the time of expiation for their sins and graciously admit them into the holy sanctuary, into which no unclean thing can enter,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

That through thy prayers and sufferings, and especially by the inestimable Sacrifice of thy Son on Calvary, renewed in each Sacrifice of the Mass, beg Jesus to receive them into the tabernacle of rest and crown their longing hopes with everlasting fruition, Son of God,
We beseech Thee, Merciful Mother, hear us.

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,
Grant them eternal rest.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,
Grant them eternal rest.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,
Grant them eternal rest.

V. Christ, hear us.
R. Christ, graciously hear us.

V. Lord, have mercy on us.
R. Christ, have mercy on us.

Pray the "Our Father" ….

V. And lead us not into temptation,
R. But deliver us from all evil. Amen.

V. From the gates of Hell,
R. Deliver their souls, O Lord.

V. May they rest in peace.
R. Amen.

V. O Lord, hear my prayer,
R. And let my cry come unto Thee.

Let us pray: O God, Creator and Redeemer of all the faithful, grant to the souls of Thy departed servants the remission of all their sins, that through our pious supplications they may obtain the pardon which they have always desired. Through the merits of Jesus Christ, Our Lord, and the intercession of His most Holy Mother. Amen.

Let us pray: O God, the Giver of pardon and the Lover of the salvation of men, we beg Thy clemency on behalf of our brethren, kinsfolk and benefactors who have departed this life, that by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and of all the saints, Thou wouldst receive them into the joys of Thine everlasting kingdom. Through the merits of Jesus Christ, Our Lord, and the intercession of His most Holy Mother.   Amen.

Let us pray: O God, to Whom it belongs always to have mercy and to spare, be favorably propitious to the souls of Thy servants and grant them the remission of all their sins, that being delivered from the bonds of this mortal life, they may be admitted to life everlasting. Through the merits of Jesus Christ, Our Lord, and the intercession of His most Holy Mother.   Amen.

FIRST DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: The Purpose of Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:
“It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins” (2 Machabees 12:46).

St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153), a Doctor of the Church, wrote: “I will without delay, immediately, come to the relief of the suffering souls in Purgatory! With sobs and sighs I will invoke the Lord; with tears I will entreat him; I will be their advocate with my prayers; I will especially offer up for them, or have offered for them, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the prayers of the Rosary, in order that the Lord, with the eyes of His unspeakable mercy, may look down upon them, changing their desolation into comfort, their misery into joy, and their pains into everlasting glory and bliss!”

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

Prayer for the departed, sacrifices, and suffrages for the dead form a part of Christian worship, and devotion towards the souls in Purgatory is a devotion which the Holy Ghost infuses with charity into the hearts of the faithful. “It is a holy and wholesome thought”, says Holy Scripture, “to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins” (2 Machabees 12:46).

In order to be perfect, devotion, to the souls in Purgatory must be animated both by a spirit of fear and a spirit of confidence. On the one hand, the Sanctity of God and His Justice inspires us with a salutary fear; on the other, His infinite Mercy gives us boundless confidence.

God is Sanctity itself, much more so than the sun is light, and no shadow of sin can endure before His face. Thine eyes are pure, says the prophet, “and thou canst not look on iniquity” (Habacuc 1:13) When iniquity manifests itself in creatures, the Sanctity of God exacts expiation, and when this expiation is made in all the rigor of justice, it is terrible. It is for this reason that the Scripture says again, “Holy and terrible is His Name” (Psalm 110); as though it would say, His Justice is terrible because His Sanctity is infinite.

The Justice of God is terrible, and it punishes with extreme rigor even the most trivial faults. The reason is, that these faults, light in our eyes, are in nowise so before God. The least sin displeases Him infinitely, and, on account of the infinite Sanctity which is offended, the demands enormous atonement. This explains the terrible severity of the pains of the other life, and should penetrate us with a holy fear.

This fear of Purgatory is a salutary fear; its effect is, not only to animate us with a charitable compassion towards the poor suffering souls, but also with a vigilant zeal for our own spiritual welfare. Think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will endeavor to avoid the least faults; think of the fire of Purgatory, and you will practice penance, that you may satisfy Divine Justice in this world rather than in the next.

Let us, however, guard against excessive fear, and not lose confidence. Let us not forget the Mercy of God, which is not less infinite than His Justice. “Thy mercy, Lord, is great above the Heavens”, says the prophet (Psalm 107); and elsewhere, “The Lord is gracious and merciful; patient, and plenteous in mercy” (Psalm 144). This ineffable mercy should calm the most lively apprehensions, and fill us with a holy confidence, according to the words, “In te, Domine, speravi, non confundar in ӕternum” … “In Thee, O Lord, I have hoped; let me never be put to confusion” (Psalm 70).

If we are animated with this double sentiment, if our confidence in God’s Mercy is equal to the fear with which His Justice inspires us, we shall have the true spirit of devotion to the souls in Purgatory. This double sentiment springs naturally from the dogma of Purgatory rightly understood a dogma which contains the double mystery of Justice and Mercy―of Justice which punishes, of Mercy which pardons. It is from this double point of view that we are about to consider Purgatory and illustrate its doctrine.

The word Purgatory is sometimes taken to mean a place, sometimes as an intermediate state between Hell and Heaven. It is, properly speaking, the condition of souls which, at the moment of death, are in the state of grace, but which have not completely expiated their faults, nor attained the degree of purity necessary to enjoy the vision of God.

Purgatory is, then, a transitory state which terminates in a life of everlasting happiness. It is not a trial by which merit may be gained or lost, but a state of atonement and expiation. The soul has arrived at the term of its earthly career; that life was a time of trial, a time of merit for the soul, a time of mercy on the part of God. This time once expired, nothing but justice is to be expected from God, whilst the soul can neither gain nor lose merit. She remains in the state in which death found her; and since it found her in the state of sanctifying grace, she is certain of never forfeiting that happy state, and of arriving at the eternal possession of God. Nevertheless, since she is burdened with certain debts of temporal punishment, she must satisfy Divine Justice by enduring this punishment in all its rigor.

Such is the signification of the word Purgatory, and the condition of the souls which are there.

On this subject the Church proposes two truths clearly defined as dogmas of Faith: first, that there is a Purgatory; second, that the souls which are in Purgatory may be assisted by the suffrages of the faithful, especially by the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

Besides these two dogmatic points, there are several doctrinal questions which the Church has not decided, and which are more or less clearly solved by the Doctors. These questions relate (1) to the location of Purgatory; (2) to the nature of the sufferings; (3) to the number and condition of the souls which are in Purgatory; (4) to the certainty which they have of their beatitude; (5) to the duration of their sufferings; (6) to the intervention of the living in their behalf, and the application of the suffrages of the Church.

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

The souls who are in Purgatory cannot, as I understand, choose but be there, and this is by God’s ordinance who therein has done justly. They cannot turn their thoughts back to themselves, nor can they say, “Such sins I have committed for which I deserve to be here,” nor, “I would that I had not committed them for then I would go now to Paradise,” nor, “That one will leave sooner than I,” nor, “I will leave sooner than he.” They can have neither of themselves nor of others any memory, whether of good or evil, whence they would have greater pain than they suffer ordinarily.

So happy are they to be within God’s ordinance, and that He should do all which pleases Him, as it pleases Him that in their greatest pain they cannot think of themselves. They see only the working of the divine goodness, which leads man to itself mercifully, so that he no longer sees aught of the pain or good which may befall him. Nor would these souls be in pure charity if they could see that pain or good. They cannot see that they are in pain because of their sins; that sight they cannot hold in their minds because in it there would be an active imperfection, which cannot be where no actual sin can be.

Only once, as they pass from this life, do they see the cause of the Purgatory they endure; never again do they see it for in another sight of it there would be self. Being then in charity from which they cannot now depart by any actual fault, they can no longer will nor desire save with the pure will of pure charity. Being in that fire of Purgatory, they are within the divine ordinance, which is pure charity, and in nothing can they depart thence for they are deprived of the power to sin as of the power to merit.

I believe no happiness can be found worthy to be compared with that of a soul in Purgatory except that of the saints in Paradise; and day by day this happiness grows as God flows into these souls, more and more as the hindrance to His entrance is consumed. Sin’s rust is the hindrance, and the fire burns the rust away so that more and more the soul opens itself up to the divine inflowing. A thing which is covered cannot respond to the sun’s rays, not because of any defect in the sun, which is shining all the time, but because the cover is an obstacle; if the cover be burnt away, this thing is open to the sun; more and more as the cover is consumed does it respond to the rays of the sun

It is in this way that rust, which is sin, covers souls, and in Purgatory is burnt away by fire; the more it is consumed, the more do the souls respond to God, the true sun. As the rust lessens and the soul is opened up to the divine ray, happiness grows; until the time be accomplished the one wanes and the other waxes. Pain however does not lessen but only the time for which pain is endured. As for will: never can the souls say these pains are pains, so contented are they with God’s ordaining with which, in pure charity, their will is united.

But, on the other hand, they endure a pain so extreme that no tongue can be found to tell it, nor could the mind understand its least pang if God by special grace did not show so much. Which least pang God of His grace showed to this Soul, but with her tongue she cannot say what it is. This sight which the Lord revealed to me has never since left my mind and I will tell what I can of it. They will understand whose mind God deigns to open.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood, which Thy Divine Son Jesus shed in the garden, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and amongst them all especially that soul which is most destitute of aid; and bring it to Thy glory, there to praise and bless Thee forever. Amen

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

SECOND DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: The Location and Levels of Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:
“We will not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that are asleep, that you be not sorrowful, even as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again; even so them, who have slept through Jesus, will God bring with Him” (1 Thessalonians 4:12).

St. Paul of the Cross: “If, during life, we have been kind to the suffering souls in Purgatory, God will see that help be not denied us after death.”

St. John Vianney: “Consider then...the magnitude of these sufferings which the souls in Purgatory endure; and the means which we have of mitigating them: our prayers, our good works, and, above all, the holy sacrifice of the Mass.”

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

Although Faith tells us nothing definite regarding the location of Purgatory, the most common opinion, that which most accords with the language of Scripture, and which is the most generally received among theologians, places it in the bowels of the Earth, not far from the Hell of the reprobates. Theologians are almost unanimous, says St. Robert Bellarmine, in teaching that Purgatory, at least the ordinary place of expiation, is situated in the interior of the Earth, that the souls in Purgatory and the reprobate [the damned] are in the same subterranean space in the deep abyss which the Scripture calls “Hell”. (Catech. Rom., ch. 6, §1).

When we say in the Apostles Creed that, after His death, Jesus Christ descended into Hell. The name “Hell”, says the Catechism of the Council of Trent, signifies those hidden places where the souls are detained which have not yet reached eternal beatitude. But these prisons are of different kinds. One is a dark and gloomy dungeon, where the damned are continually tormented by evil spirits, and by a fire which is never extinguished. This place, which is Hell properly so called, is also named Gehenna and abyss.

There is another Hell, which contains the fire of Purgatory. There the souls of the just suffer for a certain time, that they may become entirely purified before being admitted into their heavenly fatherland, where nothing defiled can ever enter.

A third Hell was that into which the souls of the saints who died before the coming of Jesus Christ were received, and in which they enjoyed peaceful repose, exempt from pain, consoled and sustained by the hope of their redemption. They were those holy souls which awaited Jesus Christ in Abraham’s bosom, and which were delivered when Christ descended into Hell. Our Savior suddenly diffused among them a brilliant light, which filled them with infinite joy, and gave them sovereign beatitude, which is the vision of God. Then was fulfilled the promise of Jesus to the good thief: “This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise!”

“A very probable opinion,” says St. Thomas Aquinas, “and one which, moreover, corresponds with the words of the saints in particular revelation is, that Purgatory has a double place for expiation. The first will be destined for the generality of souls, and is situated below, near to Hell; the second will be for particular cases, and it is from thence that so many apparitions occur” (Summa Theologica, Supplement, part. 3, ques. ult.).

Whatever, then, the interior of the Earth may be, whether it be entirely of fire, as geologists commonly say, or whether it be in any other state, there is nothing to prevent its serving as a sojourn of spirits, even of spirits clothed with a risen body. The Apostle St. Paul teaches us that the air is filled with a multitude of evil spirits: We have to combat, says he, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places (Ephesians 6:12).

On the other hand, we know that the good angels who protect us are no less numerous in the world. Now, if angels and other spirits can inhabit our atmosphere, whilst the physical world is not in the least degree changed, why cannot the souls of the dead dwell in the bosom of the Earth?

Three Levels of Purgatory
It has pleased God to show in spirit the gloomy abodes of Purgatory to some privileged souls. Of this number was the illustrious St. Frances, foundress of the Oblates, who died in Rome in 1440. God favored her with great lights concerning the state of souls in the other life. She saw Hell and its horrible torments; she saw also the interior of Purgatory.

In obedience to her superiors, she made known all that God had manifested to her. Now, the servant of God declared that, after having endured with unspeakable horror the vision of Hell, she came out of that abyss and was conducted by her celestial guide into the regions of Purgatory. There reigned neither horror nor disorder, nor despair nor eternal darkness. She saw there souls which suffered cruelly, but angels visited and assisted them in their sufferings.

Purgatory, she said, is divided into three distinct parts, which are as the three large provinces of that kingdom of suffering. They are situated the one beneath the other, and occupied by souls of different orders. These souls are buried more deeply in proportion as they are more defiled and farther removed from the time of their deliverance.

The lowest region is filled with a fierce fire, but which is not dark like that of Hell; it is a vast burning sea, throwing forth immense flames. Innumerable souls are plunged into its depths: they are those who have rendered themselves guilty of mortal sin, which they have duly confessed, but not sufficiently expiated during life. The servant of God then learned that, for all forgiven mortal sin, there remains to be undergone a suffering of seven years. This term cannot evidently be taken to mean a definite measure, since mortal sins differ in enormity, but as an average penalty. Although the souls are enveloped in the same flames, their sufferings are not the same; they differ according to the number and nature of their former sins.

In this lower Purgatory the saint beheld laity and persons consecrated to God. The laity were those who, after a life of sin, had had the happiness of being sincerely converted; the persons consecrated to God were those who had not lived according to the sanctity of their state. At that same moment she saw descend the soul of a priest whom she knew, but whose name she does not reveal. She remarked that he had his face covered with a veil which concealed a stain. Although he had led an edifying life, this priest had not always observed strict temperance, and had sought too eagerly the satisfactions of the table.

The saint was then conducted into the intermediate Purgatory, destined for souls which had deserved less rigorous chastisement. It had three distinct compartments; one resembled an immense dungeon of ice, the cold of which was indescribably intense; the second, on the contrary, was like a huge cauldron of boiling oil and pitch; the third had the appearance of a pond of liquid metal resembling molten gold or silver.

The upper Purgatory, which the saint does not describe, is the temporary abode of souls which suffer little, except the pain of loss, and approach the happy moment of their deliverance.

Such, in substance, is the vision of St. Frances relative to Purgatory.

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

All the pains of Purgatory arise from Original Sin or Actual Sin. God created the soul pure, simple and clean of all stain of sin, with a certain beatific instinct towards Himself, whence Original Sin, which the soul finds in itself, draws it away, and when actual is added to Original Sin the soul is drawn yet further away. The further it departs from its beatific instinct, the more malignant it becomes―because it corresponds less to God.

There can be no good except through participation in God, Who meets the needs of irrational creatures as He wills and has ordained, never failing them, and answers to a rational soul in the measure in which He finds it cleansed of sin’s hindrance. When, therefore, a soul has come near to the pure and clear state in which it was created, its beatific instinct discovers itself and grows unceasingly, so impetuously and with such fierce charity (drawing it to its last end) that any hindrance seems to this soul a thing past bearing. The more it sees, the more extreme is its pain.

Because the souls in Purgatory are without the guilt of sin, there is no hindrance between them and God except their pain, which holds them back―so that they cannot reach perfection. Clearly they see the grievousness of every least hindrance in their way; and see, too, that their instinct is hindered by a necessity of justice―thence is born a raging fire, like that of Hell, except that guilt is lacking to it. Guilt it is which makes the will of the damned in Hell malignant, upon whom God does not bestow His goodness, and who remain, therefore, in desperate ill will, opposed to the will of God.

Hence it is manifest that there is perversity of will, contrary to the will of God, where the guilt is known and ill will persists, and that the guilt of those―who have passed with ill will from this life to Hell―is not remitted, nor can it be, since they can no longer change the will with which they have passed out of this life, in which passage the soul is made stable in good or evil―in accordance with its deliberate will. As it is written, “Ubi te invenero” [“Where I fill find thee”―meaning: “In what state I will find thee”] that is in the hour of death, with the will to sin or dissatisfaction with sin or repentance for sin, “Ibi te judicabo” [“There I will judge thee”―basically meaning, God will judge us according to state He finds us in]. Of which judgment there is afterwards no remission, as I will show.

After death, free will can never return, for the will is fixed as it was at the moment of death. Because the souls in Hell were found at the moment of death to have in them the will to sin, they bear the guilt throughout eternity, suffering not indeed the pains they merit but such pains as they endure, and these without end. But the souls in Purgatory bear only pain, for their guilt was wiped away at the moment of their death when they were found to be ill content with their sins and repentant for their offences against divine goodness. Therefore their pain is finite and its time ever lessening, as has been said.

O misery beyond all other misery, the greater that human blindness takes it not into account!

The pain of the damned is not infinite in quantity because the dear goodness of God sheds the ray of His mercy even in Hell. For man dead in sin merits infinite pain for an infinite time, but God’s mercy has allotted infinity to him only in time and has determined the quantity of his pain; in justice, God could have given him more pain.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood, which Thy Divine Son Jesus shed in His cruel scourging, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and amongst them all, especially that soul which is nearest to its entrance into Thy glory; that, so it may soon begin to praise and bless Thee forever. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

THIRD DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: Penance on Earth is Cheaper than Penance in Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“But nothing unclean shall enter [Heaven]” (Apocalypse. 21:27).

Catherine of Genoa, who is said to have suffered the pain of Purgatory on Earth, claimed “there is in Purgatory as much pain as in Hell” (Treatise on Purgatory). Like the damned, souls there suffer hunger for the God they don’t yet see—like a man who could live without eating, hungering more and more for the bread he doesn’t have (to use St. Catherine’s image). And they suffer from fire that “will be more painful than anything man can suffer in the present life” (St. Augustine, On Psalm 37:3).

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

There is in Purgatory, as in Hell, a double pain the pain of loss and the pain of sense.

The pain of loss consists in being deprived for a time of the sight of God, who is the Supreme Good, the beatific end for which our souls are made, as our eyes are for the light. It is a moral thirst which torments the soul. The pain of sense, or sensible suffering, is the same as that which we experience in our flesh. Its nature is not defined by Faith, but it is the common opinion of the Doctors that it consists in fire and other species of suffering. The fire of Purgatory, say the Fathers, is that of Hell, of which the rich glutton speaks, “Quia crucior in hac flamma!” … “I suffer,” he says, “cruelly in these flames.”

As regards the severity of these pains, since they are inflicted by Infinite Justice, they are proportioned to the nature, gravity, and number of sins committed. Each one receives according to his works, each one must acquit himself of the debts with which he sees himself charged before God. Now these debts differ greatly in quality. Some, which have accumulated during a long life, have reached the ten thousand talents of the Gospel, that is to say, millions and tens of millions; whilst others are reduced to a few farthings, the trifling remainder of that which has not been expiated on Earth.

It follows from this that the souls undergo various kinds of sufferings, that there are innumerable degrees of expiation in Purgatory, and that some are incomparably more severe than others. However, speaking in general, the doctors agree in saying that the pains are most excruciating. The same fire, says St. Gregory, torments the damned and purifies the elect. (In Ps. 37). “Almost all theologians,” says Bellarmine, “teach that the reprobate and the souls in Purgatory suffer the action of the same fire.” (De Purgat., i. 2, cap. 6).

It must be held as certain, writes the same Bellarmine, that there is no proportion between the sufferings of this life and those of Purgatory. (De Gemitu Columbӕ, lib. 2, cap. 9). St. Augustine declares precisely the same in his commentary on Psalm 31: “Lord,” he says, “chastise me not in Thy wrath, and reject me not with those to whom Thou hast said, ‘Go into eternal fire!” but chastise me not in Thine anger: purify me rather in such manner in this life that I need not to be purified by fire in the next. Yes, I fear that fire which has been enkindled for those who will be saved, it is true, but yet so as by fire!” (1 Corinthians 3:15). They will be saved, no doubt, after the trial of fire, but that trial will be terrible, that torment will be more intolerable than all the most excruciating sufferings in this world.

Behold what St. Augustine says, and what St. Gregory, Venerable Bede, St. Anselm, and St. Bernard have said after him. St. Thomas goes even further; he maintains that the least pain of Purgatory surpasses all the sufferings of this life, whatsoever they may be. Pain, says Blessed Peter Lefevre, is deeper and more acute when it directly attacks the soul and the mind than when it reaches them only through the medium of the body. The mortal body, and the senses themselves, absorb and intercept a part of the physical, and even of moral pain. (Sentim. du Blessed Lefèvre sur la Purg. Mess, du S. Cœur, Nov. 1873).

The author of the Imitation of Christ explains this doctrine by a practical and striking sentence. Speaking in general of the sufferings of the other life: There, he says, one hour of torment will be more terrible than a hundred years of rigorous penance done here. (Book 1, chapter 24).

After having heard the theologians and doctors of the Church, let us listen to doctors of another kind; they are saints who speak of the sufferings of the other life, and who relate what God has made known to them by supernatural communication. St. Catherine of Genoa, in her treatise on Purgatory says, “The souls endure a torment so extreme that no tongue can describe it, nor could the understanding conceive the least notion of it, if God did not make it known by a particular grace.” “No tongue,” she adds, “can express, no mind form any idea of what Purgatory is. As to the suffering, it is equal to that of Hell.”

St. Teresa, in the Castle of the Soul, speaking of the pain of loss, expresses herself thus: “The pain of loss, or the privation of the sight of God, exceeds all the most excruciating sufferings we can imagine, because the souls urged on towards God as to the center of their aspiration, are continually repulsed by His Justice. Picture to yourself a shipwrecked mariner who, after having long battled with the waves, comes at last within reach of the shore, only to find himself constantly thrust back by an invisible hand. What torturing agonies! Yet those of the souls in Purgatory are a thousand times greater.” (Part 6, chapter 11).

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

As the clean and purified spirit can find rest only in God, having been created for this end, so there is no place save Hell for the soul in sin, for whose end Hell was ordained by God. When the soul as it leaves the body is in mortal sin, then, in the instant in which spirit and body are separated, the soul goes to the place ordained for it, unguided save by the nature of its sin. And if at that moment the soul were bound by no ordinance proceeding from God’s justice, it would go to a yet greater Hell than that in which it abides, for it would be outside His ordinance, in which divine mercy has part so that God gives the soul less pain than it deserves. The soul, finding no other place to hand nor any holding less evil for it, casts itself by God’s ordinance into Hell as into its proper place.

To return to our matter which is the Purgatory of the soul separated from the body when it is no longer clean as it was created. Seeing in itself the impediment which can be taken away only by means of Purgatory, it casts itself therein swiftly and willingly. Were there not the ordinance it thus obeys, one fit to rid it of its encumbrance, it would in that instant beget within itself a Hell worse than Purgatory, for it would see that because of that impediment it could not draw near to God, its end. So much does God import that Purgatory in comparison counts not at all, for all that it is, as has been said, like Hell. But compared to God, it appears almost nothing.

When I look at God, I see no gate to Paradise, and yet because God is all mercy he who wills enters there. God stands before us with open arms to receive us into His glory. But well I see the divine essence to be of such purity, greater far than can be imagined, that the soul in which there is even the least note of imperfection would rather cast itself into a thousand Hells than find itself thus stained in the presence of the Divine Majesty. Therefore the soul, understanding that Purgatory has been ordained to take away those stains, casts itself therein, and seems to itself to have found great mercy in that it can rid itself there of the impediment which is the stain of sin.

No tongue can tell nor explain, no mind understand, the grievousness of Purgatory. But I, though I see that there is in Purgatory as much pain as in Hell, yet see the soul which has the least stain of imperfection accepting Purgatory, as I have said, as though it were a mercy, and holding its pains of no account as compared with the least stain which hinders a soul in its love. I seem to see that the pain which souls in Purgatory endure because of whatever in them displeases God, that is what they have willfully done against His so great goodness, is greater than any other pain they feel in Purgatory. And this is because, being in grace, they see the truth and the grievousness of the hindrance which stays them from drawing near to God.

All these things which I have surely in mind, in so much as in this life I have been able to understand them, are, as compared with what I have said, extreme in their greatness. Beside them, all the sights and sounds and justice and truths of this world seem to me lies and nothingness. I am left confused because I cannot find words extreme enough for these things.

I perceive there to be so much conformity between God and the soul that when He sees it in the purity in which His Divine Majesty created it He gives it a burning love, which draws it to Himself, which is strong enough to destroy it, immortal though it be, and which causes it to be so transformed in God that it sees itself as though it were none other than God. Unceasingly He draws it to Himself and breathes fire into it, never letting it go until He has led it to the state whence it came forth, that is to the pure cleanliness in which it was created.

When with its inner sight the soul sees itself drawn by God with such loving fire, then it is melted by the heat of the glowing love for God, its most dear Lord, which it feels overflowing it. And it sees by the divine light that God does not cease from drawing it, nor from leading it, lovingly and with much care and unfailing foresight, to its full perfection, doing this of His pure love. But the soul, being hindered by sin, cannot go whither God draws it; it cannot follow the uniting look with which He would draw it to Himself. Again the soul perceives the grievousness of being held back from seeing the divine light; the soul’s instinct too, being drawn by that uniting look, craves to be unhindered. I say that it is the sight of these things which begets in the souls the pain they feel in Purgatory. Not that they make account of their pain; most great though it be, they deem it a far less evil than to find themselves going against the will of God, whom they clearly see to be on fire with extreme and pure love for them.

Strongly and unceasingly this love draws the soul with that uniting look, as though it had nothing else than this to do. Could the soul who understood find a worse Purgatory in which to rid itself sooner of all the hindrance in its. way, it would swiftly fling itself therein, driven by the conforming love between itself and God.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood, which Thy Divine Son Jesus shed in His bitter crowning with thorns, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and in particular, amongst them all, deliver that one which would be the last to issue from those pains, that it tarry not so long a time before it comes to praise Thee in Thy glory and bless Thee forever. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

FOURTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: Pay Your Debts Now, Before It Is Too Late!

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him: lest perhaps the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last farthing!” (Matthew 5:25-26).

St. Alphonsus Liguori: “The blessed souls in Purgatory are the Lord’s eternal spouses, and most grateful are they to those who obtain their deliverance from prison, or even a mitigation of their torments. When, therefore, they arrive in Heaven, they will be sure to remember all who have prayed for them.”

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

If the pain of loss makes but a feeble impression upon us, it is far different with the pain of sense; the torment of fire, the torture of a sharp and intense cold, affrights our sensibility. This is why Divine Mercy, wishing to excite a holy fear in our souls, speaks but little of the pain of loss, but we are continually shown the fire, the cold, and other torments, which constitute the pain of sense. This is what we see in the Gospel, and in particular revelations, by which God is pleased to manifest to His servants from time to time the mysteries of the other life. Let us mention one of these revelations. In the first place, let us see what the pious and learned Cardinal Bellarmine quotes from the Venerable St. Bede. England has been witness in our own days, writes Bede, to a singular prodigy, which may be compared to the miracles of the first ages of the Church.

To excite the living to fear the death of the soul, God permitted that a man, after having slept the sleep of death, should return to life and reveal what he had seen in the other world. The frightful, unheard-of details which he relates, and his life of extraordinary penance, which corresponded with his words, produced a lively impression throughout the country. I will now resume the principal circumstances of this history.

There was in Northumberland a man named Drithelm, who, with his family, led a most Christian life. He fell sick, and his malady increasing day by day, he was soon reduced to extremity, and died, to the great desolation and grief of his wife and children. The latter passed the night in tears by the remains, but the following day, before his interment, they saw him suddenly return to life, arise, and place himself in a sitting posture. At this sight they were seized with such fear that they all took to flight, with the exception of the wife, who, trembling, remained alone with her risen husband.

He reassured her immediately: “Fear not,” he said; “it is God who restores to me my life; He wishes to show in my person a man raised from the dead. I have yet long to live upon Earth, but my new life will be very different from the one I led heretofore.”

Then he arose full of health, went straight to the chapel or church of the place, and there remained long in prayer. He returned home only to take leave of those who had been dear to him upon Earth, to whom he declared that he would live only to prepare himself for death, and advised them to do likewise. Then, having divided his property into three parts, he gave one to his children, another to his wife, and reserved the third part to give in alms. When he had distributed all to the poor, and had reduced himself to extreme indigence, he went and knocked at the door of a monastery, and begged the Abbot to receive him as a penitent Religious, who would be a servant to all the others.

The Abbot gave him a retired cell, which he occupied for the rest of his life. Three exercises divided his time prayer, the hardest labor, and extraordinary penances. The most rigorous fasts he accounted as nothing. In winter he was seen to plunge himself into frozen water, and remain there for hours and hours in prayer, whilst he recited the whole Psalter of David.

The mortified life of Drithelm, his downcast eyes, even his features, indicated a soul struck with fear of the judgments of God. He kept a perpetual silence, but on being pressed to relate, for the edification of others, what God had manifested to him after his death, he thus described his vision:

“On leaving my body, I was received by a benevolent person, who took me under his guidance. His face was brilliant, and he appeared surrounded with light. He arrived at a large deep valley of immense extent, all fire on one side, all ice and snow on the other; on the one hand braziers and caldrons of flame, on the other the most intense cold and the blast of a glacial wind.

“This mysterious valley was filled with innumerable souls, which, tossed as by a furious tempest, threw themselves from one side to the other. When they could no longer endure the violence of the fire, they sought relief amidst the ice and snow; but finding only a new torture, they cast themselves again into the midst of the flames.

“I contemplated in a stupor these continual vicissitudes of horrible torments, and as far as my sight could extend, I saw nothing but a multitude of souls which suffered without ever having repose. Their very aspect inspired me with fear. I thought at first that I saw Hell; but my guide, who walked before me, turned to me and said, ‘No―this is not, as you think, the Hell of the reprobate. Do you know’, he continued, ‘what place this is?’

“‘No!’, I answered.

“‘Know’, he resumed, ‘that this valley, where you see so much fire and so much ice, is the place where the souls of those are punished who, during life, have neglected to confess their sins, and who have deferred their conversion to the end. Thanks to a special mercy of God, they have had the happiness of sincerely repenting before death, of confessing and detesting their sins. This is why they are not damned, and on the great day of judgment will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Several of them will obtain their deliverance before that time, by the merits of prayers, alms, and fasts, offered in their favor by the living, and especially in virtue of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered for their relief!’”

Such was the recital of Drithelm. When asked why he so rudely treated his body, why he plunged himself into frozen water, he replied that he had seen other torments, and cold of another kind.

If his brethren expressed astonishment that he could endure these extraordinary austerities, “I have seen,” said he, “penances still more astonishing.” To the day when it pleased God to call him to Himself, he ceased not to afflict his body, and although broken down with age, he would accept no alleviation.

This event produced a deep sensation in England; a great number of sinners, touched by the words of Drithelm, and struck by the austerity of his life, became sincerely converted.

This fact, adds Bellarmine, appears to me of incontestable truth, since, besides being conformable to the words of Holy Scripture, “Let him pass from the snow waters to excessive heat!” (Job 29:19). Venerable Bede relates it as a recent and well-known event. More than this, it was followed by the conversion of a great number of sinners, the sign of the work of God, who is accustomed to work prodigies in order to produce fruit in souls.

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

I see, too, certain rays and shafts of light which go out from that divine love towards the soul and are penetrating and strong enough to seem as though they must destroy not only the body but the soul too, were that possible. Two works are wrought by these rays, the first purification and the second destruction.

Look at gold: the more you melt it, the better it becomes; you could melt it until you had destroyed in it every imperfection. Thus does fire work on material things. The soul cannot be destroyed in so far as it is in God, but in so far as it is in itself it can be destroyed; the more it is purified, the more is self destroyed within it, until at last it is pure in God.

When gold has been purified up to twenty-four carats, it can no longer be consumed by any fire; not gold itself but only dross can be burnt away. Thus the divine fire works in the soul: God holds the soul in the fire until its every imperfection is burnt away and it is brought to perfection, as it were to the purity of twenty-four carats, each soul however according to its own degree.

When the soul has been purified it stays wholly in God, having nothing of self in it; its being is in God who has led this cleansed soul to Himself; it can suffer no more for nothing is left in it to be burnt away; were it held in the fire when it has thus been cleansed, it would feel no pain. Rather the fire of divine love would be to it like eternal life and in no way contrary to it.

The soul was created as well conditioned as it is capable of being for reaching perfection if it live as God has ordained and do not foul itself with any stain of sin. But having fouled itself by Original Sin, it loses its gifts and graces and lies dead, nor can it rise again save by God’s means. And when God, by baptism, has raised it from the dead, it is still prone to evil, inclining and being led to Actual Sin unless it resist. And thus it dies again.

Then God by another special grace raises it again, yet it stays so sullied and so turned to self that all the divine workings of which we have spoken are needed to recall it to its first state in which God created it; without them it could never get back thither. And when the soul finds itself on the road back to its first state, its need to be transformed in God kindles in it a fire so great that this is its Purgatory. Not that it can look upon this as Purgatory, but its instinct to God, aflame and thwarted, makes Purgatory.

A last act of love is done by God without help from man. So many hidden imperfections are in the soul that, did it see them, it would live in despair. But in the state of which we have spoken they are all burnt away, and only when they have gone does God show them to the soul, so that it may see that divine working which kindles the fire of love in which its imperfections have been burnt away.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood which Thy Divine Son Jesus shed through the streets of Jerusalem when He carried the cross upon His sacred shoulders, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and especially that soul which is richest in merits before Thee; that so, on that throne of glory which awaits it, it may magnify Thee and bless Thee forever. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

FIFTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: Suffering to Help the Poor Souls in Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“It is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins” (2 Machabees 12:46).

Prayer of St. Gertrude: “Eternal Father! I offer you the most precious blood of your Divine Son Jesus in union with the Masses said throughout the world today for all the holy souls in Purgatory for sinners everywhere sinners in the universal church those in my own home and within my family. Amen. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.”

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

The learned and pious Cardinal, St. Robert Bellarmine, then proceeds to relate the history of St. Christine the Admirable, who lived in Belgium at the close of the twelfth century, and whose body is preserved today in St. Trond, in the church of the Redemptorist Fathers. The Life of this illustrious virgin was, he says, written by Thomas de Cantimpré, a Religious of the Order of St. Dominic, an author worthy of credit and contemporary with the saint. Cardinal James de Vitry, in the preface to the Life of Maria d’Ognies, speaks of a great number of holy women and illustrious virgins; but the one whom he admires above all others is St. Christine, of whom he relates the most wonderful deeds.

This servant of God, having passed the first years of her life in humility and patience, died at the age of thirty-two. When she was about to be buried, and the body was already in the church resting in an open coffin, according to the custom of the time, she arose full of vigor, stupefying with amazement the whole city of St. Trond, which had witnessed this wonder. The astonishment increased when they learned from her own mouth what had happened to her after her death. Let us hear her own account of it.

“As soon,” said she, “as my soul was separated from my body, it was received by angels, who conducted it to a very gloomy place, entirely filled with souls. The torments which they there endured appeared to me so excessive, that it is impossible for me to give any idea of their rigor. I saw among them many of my acquaintances, and, deeply touched by their sad condition, I asked what place it was, for I believed it to be Hell. My guide answered me that it was Purgatory, where sinners were punished who, before death, had repented of their faults, but had not made worthy satisfaction to God. From thence I was conducted into Hell, and there also I recognized among the reprobates some whom I had formerly known.

“The angels then transported me into Heaven, even to the throne of the Divine Majesty. The Lord regarded me with a favorable eye, and I experienced an extreme joy, because I thought to obtain the grace of dwelling eternally with Him. But my Heavenly Father, seeing what passed in my heart, said to me these words:

“‘Assuredly, my dear daughter, you will one day be with Me. Now, however, I allow you to choose, either to remain with Me henceforth from this time, or to return again to Earth to accomplish a mission of charity and suffering. In order to deliver from the flames of Purgatory those souls which have inspired you with so much compassion, you shall suffer for them upon Earth; you shall endure great torments, without, however, dying from their effects. And not only will you relieve the departed, but the example which you will give to the living, and your life of continual suffering, will lead sinners to be converted and to expiate their crimes. After having ended this new life, you shall return here laden with merits!’

“At these words, seeing the great advantages offered to me for souls, I replied, without hesitation, that I would return to life, and I arose at that same instant. It is for this sole object, the relief of the departed and the conversion of sinners, that I have returned to this world. Therefore be not astonished at the penances that I shall practice, nor at the life that you will see me lead from henceforward. It will be so extraordinary that nothing like to it has ever been seen.”

All this was related by the saint herself; let us now see what the biographer adds in the different chapters of her Life.

“Christine immediately commenced the work for which she had been sent by God. Renouncing all the comforts of life, and reduced to extreme destitution, she lived without house or fire, more miserable than the birds of the air, which have a nest to shelter them. Not content with these privations, she eagerly sought all that could cause her suffering. She threw herself into burning furnaces, and there suffering so great torture that she could no longer bear it, she uttered the most frightful cries. She remained for a long time in the fire, and yet, on coming forth, no sign of burning was found upon her body. In winter, when the River Meuse was frozen, she plunged herself into it, staying in that cold river not only hours and days, but for entire weeks, all the while praying to God and imploring His mercy. Sometimes, whilst praying in the icy waters, she allowed herself to be carried by the current down to a mill, the wheel of which whirled her round in a manner frightful to behold, yet without breaking or dislocating one of her bones. On other occasions, followed by dogs, which bit and tore her flesh, she ran, enticing them into the thickets and among the thorns, until she was covered with blood; nevertheless, on her return, no wound or scar was to be seen.”

Such are the works of admirable penance described by the author of the Life of St. Christine. This writer was a Bishop, a suffragan of the Archbishop of Cambray; and “we have,” says St. Robert Bellarmine, “reason for believing his testimony, since he has for guarantee another grave author, James de Vitry, Bishop and Cardinal, and because he relates what happened in his own time, and even in the province where he lived. Besides, the sufferings of this admirable virgin were not hidden. Everyone could see that she was in the midst of the flames without being consumed, and covered with wounds, every trace of which disappeared a few moments afterwards. But more than this was the marvelous life she led for forty-two years after she was raised from the dead, God clearly showing that the wonders wrought in her by virtue from on high. The striking conversions which she brought about, and the evident miracles which occurred after her death, manifestly proved the finger of God, and the truth of that which, after her resurrection, she had revealed concerning the other life.”

Therefore, St. Robert Bellarmine argues, “God willed to silence those libertines [immoral persons] who make open profession of believing in nothing, and who have the audacity to ask in scorn, Who has returned from the other world? Who has ever seen the torments of Hell or Purgatory? Behold two witnesses. They assure us that they have seen them, and that they are dreadful. What follows, then, if not that the incredulous are inexcusable, and that those who believe and nevertheless neglect to do penance are still more to be condemned?”

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

Know that what man deems perfection in himself is in God’s sight faulty, for all the things a man does which he sees or feels or means or wills or remembers to have a perfect seeming are wholly fouled and sullied unless he acknowledge them to be from God. If a work is to be perfect it must be wrought in us but not chiefly by us, for God’s works must be done in Him and not wrought chiefly by man.

Such works are those last wrought in us by God of His pure and clean love, by Him alone without merit of ours, and so penetrating are they and such fire do they kindle in the soul, that the body which wraps it seems to be consumed as in a furnace never to be quenched until death.

It is true that love for God which fills the soul to overflowing, gives it, so I see it, a happiness beyond what can be told, but this happiness takes not one pang from the pain of the souls in Purgatory. Rather the love of these souls, finding itself hindered, causes their pain; and the more perfect is the love of which God has made them capable, the greater is their pain.

So that the souls in Purgatory enjoy the greatest happiness and endure the greatest pain; the one does not hinder the other.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Body and Blood of Thy Divine Son Jesus, which He gave with His own hand upon the eve of His passion to His beloved Apostles to be their meat and drink, and which He left to His whole Church to be a perpetual sacrifice and life-giving food of His own faithful people, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and especially that one which was most devoted to this mystery of infinite love; that, with Thy Divine Son, and with Thy Holy Spirit, it may ever praise Thee for this Thy wondrous love in Thy eternal glory. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

SIXTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: The Pains of Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work burn, then he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire!” (1 Corinthians 3:13-15).

St. John Vianney: “I come to tell you that they suffer in Purgatory, that they weep, and that they demand with urgent cries the help of your prayers and your good works. I seem to hear them crying from the depths of those fires which devour them: ‘Tell our loved ones, tell our children, tell all our relatives how great the evils are which they are making us suffer! We throw ourselves at their feet to implore the help of their prayers!’”

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

We find it in the Life of the venerable servant of God, Angela Tholomei, a Dominican nun that she was raised from the dead by her own brother, and gave a testimony of the rigor of God’s judgments. Blessed John Baptist Tholomei, whose rare virtues and the gift of miracles has placed him on our altars, had a sister, Angela Tholomei, the heroism of whose virtue has also been recognized by the Church. She fell dangerously sick, and her holy brother by earnest prayer besought her cure. Our Lord replied, as He did formerly to the sister of Lazarus, that He would not cure Angela, but that He would do more; He would raise her from the dead, for the glory of God and the good of souls. She died, recommending herself to the prayers of her holy brother.

Whilst she was being carried to the tomb, Blessed John Baptist Tholomei, in obedience, no doubt, to an inspiration of the Holy Spirit, approached the coffin, and, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, commanded his sister to come forth. Immediately she awoke as from a profound slumber, and returned to life.

That holy soul seemed struck with terror, and related such things concerning the severity of God’s judgments as make us shudder. She commenced, at the same time, to lead a life which proved the truth of her words. Her penance was frightful. Not content with the ordinary practices of the saints, such as fasting, watching, hair-shirts, and bloody disciplines, she went so far as to cast herself into flames, and to roll herself therein until her flesh was entirely burnt. Her macerated body became an object of pity and of horror. She was censured and accused of destroying, by her excess, the idea of true Christian penance.

She continued, nevertheless, and contented herself with replying, “If you knew the rigors of the judgments of God, you would not speak thus. What are my trifling penances compared with the torments reserved in the other life for those infidelities which we so easily permit ourselves in this world? What are they? What are they? Would that I could do a hundred times more!”

There is no question here, as we see, of the tortures to which great sinners converted before death are subjected, but of the chastisements which God inflicts upon a fervent Religious for the slightest faults.

The same rigor reveals itself on November 16th, 1859, at the convent of Franciscan Tertiaries, at Foligno, near Assisi, in Italy, where a Religious sister named Teresa Gesta, died after an exemplary life having been for many years mistress of novices, and who at the same time had charge of the sacristy of the community. Sister Teresa was a model of fervor and charity. She died suddenly, November 4th, 1859, of a stroke of apoplexy.

Twelve days later, on November 16th, a sister named Anna Felicia, who succeeded Teresa in her in office, went to the sacristy and was about to enter, when she heard moans which appeared to come from the interior of the room. She felt herself overpowered by fear. “Jesus! Mary!” she cried, “What can that be?” She had not finished speaking when she heard a plaintive voice, accompanied with a painful sigh, “Oh! my God, how I suffer!” The sister, stupefied, immediately recognized the voice of poor Sister Teresa. Then the room was filled with a thick smoke, and the spirit of Sister Teresa appeared, moving towards the door, and gliding along by the wall. Having reached the door, she cried aloud, “Behold a proof of the mercy of God.” Saying these words, she struck the upper panel of the door, and there left the print of her right hand, burnt in the wood as with a red-hot iron. She then disappeared. Sister Anna Felicia was left half dead with fright.

She burst forth into loud cries for help. One of her companions ran, then a second, and finally the whole community. They pressed around her, astonished to find a strong odor of burnt wood. Sister Anna Felicia told what had occurred, and showed them the terrible impression on the door. They instantly recognized the hand of Sister Teresa, which had been remarkably small. During the investigation, which was held immediately, in the presence of a large number of witnesses, the tomb of Sister Teresa was opened, and the impression upon the door was found to correspond exactly with the hand of the deceased. “The door, with the burnt print of the hand,” adds Mgr. Segur, “is preserved with great veneration in the convent. The Mother Abbess, witness of the fact, was pleased to show it to me herself.”

The historian Bzovius, in his History of Poland, under the date 1598, relates a miraculous event which happened to the Venerable Stanislaus Chocosca, one of the luminaries of the Order of St. Dominic in Poland (Cf. Rossignoli, Merveilles, 67). One day, whilst this Religious, full of charity for the departed, recited the Rosary, he saw appear near him a soul all enveloped in flames. As she besought him to have pity on her, and to alleviate the intolerable sufferings which the fire of Divine Justice caused her to endure, the holy man asked her if this fire was more painful than that of Earth? “Ah!” she cried, “all the fires of Earth compared to that of Purgatory are like a refreshing breeze!” (Ignes alii levis aurӕ locum tenent si cum ardore meo comparentur).

Stanislaus could scarcely believe it. “I wish,” he said, “to have a proof. If God will permit, for your relief, and for the good of my soul, I consent to suffer a part of your pains.”

“Alas! You could not do this! Know that no human being could endure such torment and live! However, God will permit you to feel it in a light degree. Stretch forth your hand.”

Chocosca extended his hand, and the departed let fall a drop of sweat, or at least of a liquid which resembled it. At the same instant the Religious uttered a piercing cry and fell fainting to the ground, so frightfully intense was the pain. His brethren ran to the spot and hastened to give him the assistance which his condition required. When restored to consciousness, he related the terrible event which had occurred, and of which they had a visible proof.

“Ah! My dear Fathers,” he continued, “if we knew the severity of the Divine chastisements, we should never commit sin, nor should we cease to do penance in this life, in order to avoid expiation in the next.”

Stanislaus was confined to his bed from that moment. He lived one year longer in the most cruel suffering caused by his terrible wound; then, for the last time, exhorting his brethren to remember the rigors of Divine Justice, he peacefully slept in the Lord.

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

If the souls in Purgatory could purge themselves by contrition, they would pay all their debt in one instant such blazing vehemence would their contrition have in the clear light shed for them on the grievousness of being hindered from reaching their end and the love of God.

Know surely that not the least farthing of payment is remitted to those souls, for thus has it been determined by God’s justice. So much for what God does as for what the souls do, they can no longer choose for themselves, nor can they see or will, save as God wills, for thus has it been determined for them.

And if any alms be done them by those who are in the world to lessen the time of their pain, they cannot turn with affection to contemplate the deed, saving as it is weighed in the most just scales of the divine will. They leave all in God’s hands who pays Himself as His infinite goodness pleases.

If they could turn to contemplate the alms except as it is within the divine will, there would be self in what they did and they would lose sight of God’s will, which would make a Hell for them. Therefore they await immovably all that God gives them, whether pleasure and happiness or pain, and never more can they turn their eyes back to themselves.

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood, which Thy Divine Son shed on this day, upon the wood of the Cross, from His most sacred hands and feet, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and especially that soul for which I am most bound to pray; so that I may not be the cause which hinders Thee from admitting it quickly to the possession of Thy glory where it may praise Thee and bless Thee forever. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

SEVENTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted each day)
Theme: The Duration of a Sinner's Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin!” (Ecclesiasticus 5:5).

“Be at agreement with thy adversary betimes, whilst thou art in the way with him: lest perhaps the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison! Amen I say to thee, thou shalt not go out from thence till thou repay the last penny!” (Matthew 5:26).

The “prison” alluded to in verse 25 is purgatory, according to Tertullian, St. Cyprian, Origen, St. Ambrose and St. Jerome, while the “penny” represents the most minor sins that one commits.

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

Faith does not teach us the precise duration of the pains of Purgatory. We know in general that they are measured by Divine Justice, and that for each one they are proportioned to the number and gravity of the faults which he has not yet expiated. God may, however, without prejudice to His Justice, abridge these sufferings by augmenting .their intensity; the Church Militant also may obtain their remission by the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and other suffrages... offered for the departed.

According to the common opinion of the doctors, the expiatory pains are of long duration. “There is no doubt,” says the Cardinal and Doctor of the Church, St. Robert Bellarmine (De Gemitu, lib. 2, c. 9), “that the pains of Purgatory are not limited to ten or twenty years, and that they last in some cases entire centuries. But allowing it to be true that their duration did not exceed ten or twenty years, can we account it as nothing to have to endure for ten or twenty years the most excruciating sufferings without the least alleviation? If a man was assured that he should suffer some violent pain in his feet, or his head, or teeth for the space of twenty years, and that without ever sleeping or taking the least repose, would he not a thousand times rather die than live in such a state? And if the choice were given to him between a life thus miserable and the loss of all his temporal goods, would he hesitate to make the sacrifice of his fortune to be delivered from such a torment? Shall we then find any difficulty in embracing labor and penance to free ourselves from the sufferings of Purgatory? Shall we fear to practice the most painful exercises: vigils, fasts, almsgiving, long prayers, and especially contrition, accompanied with sighs and tears?”

These words of St. Robert Bellarmine comprise the whole doctrine of the saints and theologians.

Father Mumford, of the Company of Jesus, in his “Treatise on Charity towards the Departed,” bases the long duration of Purgatory on a calculation of probability, which we shall give in substance. He goes out on the principle that, according to the words of the Holy Ghost, The just man falls seven times a day (Proverbs 24:16), that is to say, that even those who apply themselves most perfectly to the service of God, notwithstanding their good-will, commit a great number of faults in the infinitely pure eyes of God. We have but to enter into our own conscience, and there analyze before God our thoughts, our words, and works, to be convinced of this sad effect of human misery. Oh! how easy it is to lack respect in prayer, to prefer our ease to the accomplishment of duty, to sin by vanity, by impatience, by sensuality, by uncharitable thoughts and words, by want of conformity to the will of God! The day is long; is it very difficult for even a virtuous person to commit, I do not say seven, but twenty or thirty of this kind of faults and imperfections?

Let us take a moderate estimate, and suppose that you commit about ten faults a day; at the end of 365 days you will have a sum of 3,650 faults. Let us diminish, and, to facilitate the calculation, place it at 3,000 per year. At the end of ten years this will amount to 30,000, and at the end of twenty years to 60,000. Suppose that of these 60,000 faults you have already expiated one half, by your penances and good works―there will still remain 30,000 to be atoned for.

Let us continue our hypothesis: You die after these twenty years of virtuous life, and appear before God with a debt of 30,000 faults, which you must discharge in Purgatory. How much time will you need to accomplish this expiation? Suppose, on an average, each fault requires one hour of Purgatory. This measure is very moderate, if we judge by the revelations of the saints; but at any rate this will give you a Purgatory of 30,000 hours. Now, do you know how many years these 30,000 hours represent? Three years, three months, and fifteen days. Thus a good Christian who watches over himself, who applies himself to penance and good works, finds himself liable to three years, three months, and fifteen days of Purgatory.

The preceding calculation is based on an estimate which is lenient in the extreme. Now, if you extend the duration of the pain, and, instead of an hour, you take a day for the expiation of a fault, if, instead of having nothing but venial sins, you bring before God a debt resulting from mortal sins, more or less numerous, which you formerly committed, if you assign, on the average, as St. Frances of Rome says, seven years for the expiation of one mortal sin, remitted as to the guilt, who does not see that we arrive at an appalling duration, and that the expiation may easily be prolonged for many years, and even for centuries?

Years and centuries in torments! Oh if we only thought of it, with what care should we not avoid the least faults! With what fervor should we not practice penance to make satisfaction in this world!

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

So intimate with God are the souls in Purgatory and so changed to His will, that in all things they are content with His most holy ordinance. And if a soul were brought to see God when it had still a trifle of which to purge itself, a great injury would be done it. For since pure love and supreme justice could not brook that stained soul, and to bear with its presence would not befit God, it would suffer a torment worse than ten purgatories. To see God when full satisfaction had not yet been made Him, even if the time of purgation lacked but the twinkling of an eye, would be unbearable to that soul. It would sooner go to a thousand Hells, to rid itself of the little rust still clinging to it, than stand in the divine presence when it was not yet wholly cleansed.

And so that blessed soul, seeing the aforesaid things by the divine light, said: “I would fain send up a cry so loud that it would put fear in all men on the earth. I would say to them: ‘Wretches, why do you let yourselves be thus blinded by the world, you whose need is so great and grievous, as you will know at the moment of death, and who make no provision for it whatsoever?’

“You have all taken shelter beneath hope in God’s mercy, which is, you say, very great, but you see not that this great goodness of God will judge you for having gone against the will of so good a Lord. His goodness should constrain you to do all His will, not give you hope in ill-doing, for His justice cannot fail but in one way or another must needs be fully satisfied.

“Cease to hug yourselves, saying: ‘I will confess my sins and then receive plenary indulgence, and at that moment I shall be purged of all my sins and thus shall be saved.’ Think of the confession and the contrition needed for that plenary indulgence, so hardly come by that, if you knew, you would tremble in great fear, more sure you would never win it than that you ever could.”

Prayer
Lord God almighty, I beseech Thee, by the Precious Blood, which gushed forth from the side of Thy Divine Son Jesus in the sight and to the extreme pain of His most holy Mother, deliver the souls in Purgatory, and especially that one amongst them all which was ever the most devout to this great Lady; that it may soon attain unto Thy glory, there to praise Thee in her, and her in Thee, world without end. Amen.

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

EIGHTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: Paying in Purgatory for Worldliness on Earth

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

Why must souls thus suffer before being admitted to see the face of God? What is the matter, what is the subject of these expiations? What has the fire of Purgatory to purify, to consume in them? It is, say the doctors, the stains left by their sins.

But what is here understood by stains? According to most theologians, it is not the guilt of sin, but the pain or the debt of pain proceeding from sin. To understand this well, we must remember that sin produces a double effect on the soul, which we call the debt (reatus) of guilt and the debt of pain; it renders the soul not only guilty, but deserving of pain or chastisement. Now, after the guilt is pardoned, it generally happens that the pain remains to be undergone, either entirely or in part, and this must be endured either in the present life or in the life to come.

The souls in Purgatory retain not the slightest stain of guilt; the venial guilt which they had at the moment of their death has disappeared in the order of pure charity, with which they are inflamed in the other life, but they still bear the debt of suffering which they had not discharged before death.

This debt proceeds from all the faults committed during their life, especially from mortal sins remitted as to the guilt, but which they have neglected to expiate by worthy fruits of exterior penance.

Such is the common teaching of theologians, which Suarez sums up in his “Treatise on the Sacrament of Penance.” (Vol. 19, DC Pœnit., Disput. 11, sect. 4).

“We conclude then,” he says, “that all venial sins with which a just man dies are remitted as to the guilt, at the moment when the soul is separated from the body, by virtue of an act of love of God, and the perfect contrition which it then excites over all its past faults. In fact, the soul at this moment knows its condition perfectly, and the sins of which it has been guilty before God; at the same time, it is mistress of its faculties, to be able to act. On the other hand, on the part of God, the most efficacious helps are given to her, that she may act according to the measure of sanctifying grace which she possesses It follows, then, that in this perfect disposition, the soul acts without the least hesitation. It turns directly towards its God, and finds itself freed from all its venial sins by an act of sovereign loathing of sin. This universal and efficacious act suffices for the remission of their guilt. All stain of guilt has then disappeared; but the pain remains to be endured, in all its rigor and long duration, at least for those souls that are not assisted by the living. They cannot obtain the least relief for themselves, because the time of merit has passed; they can no longer merit, they can but suffer, and in that way pay to the terrible justice of God all that they owe, even to the last penny. (Matthew 5: 26).”

These debts of pain are the remains of sin, and a kind of stain, which intercepts the vision of God, and places an obstacle to the union of the soul with its last end. Since the souls in Purgatory are freed from the guilt of sin, writes St. Catherine of Genoa, there is no other barrier between them and their union with God save the remains of sin, from which they must be purified. (Treatise on Purgatory, chapter 3). This hindrance which they feel within them causes them to suffer the torments of the damned, of which I have spoken elsewhere, and retards the moment when the instinct by which they are drawn towards God as to their Sovereign Beatitude will attain its full perfection. They see clearly how serious before God is even the slightest obstacle raised by the remains of sin, and that it is by necessity of justice that He delays the full gratification of their desire of everlasting bliss. This sight enkindles within them a burning flame, like that of Hell, yet without the guilt of sin.

Souls that allow themselves to be dazzled by the vanities of the world, even if they have the good fortune to escape damnation, will have to undergo terrible punishment. Let us open the “Revelations of St. Bridget,” which are held in such esteem by the Church. We read there, in Book 6, that the saint saw herself transported in spirit into Purgatory, and that, among others, she saw there a young lady of high birth who had formerly abandoned herself to the luxury and vanities of the world. This unfortunate soul related to her the history of her life, and the sad state in which she then was.

“Happily,” said she, “before death I confessed my sins in such dispositions as to escape Hell, but now I suffer here to expiate the worldly life that my mother did not prevent me from leading! Alas!” she added, with a sigh, “this head, which loved to be adorned, and which sought to draw the attention of others, is now devoured with flames within and without, and these flames are so violent that every moment it seems to me that I must die. These shoulders, these arms, which I loved to see admired, are cruelly bound in chains of red-hot iron. These feet, formerly trained for the dance, are now surrounded with vipers that tear them with their fangs and soil them with their filthy slime; all these members which I have adorned with jewels, flowers, and divers other ornaments, are now a prey to the most horrible torture. O mother, mother!” she cried, “how culpable have you been in my regard! It was you who, by a fatal indulgence, encouraged my taste for display and extravagant expense; it was you that took me to theatres, parties, and balls, and to those worldly assemblies which are the ruin of souls. ... If I have not incurred eternal damnation, it was because a special grace of God’s mercy touched my heart with sincere repentance. I made a good confession, and thus I have been delivered from Hell, yet only to see myself precipitated into the most horrible torments of Purgatory.”

We have remarked already that what is said of the tortured members must not be taken literally, because the soul is separated from the body; but God, supplying the want of corporal organs, makes the soul experience such sensations as have been just described. The biographer of the saint tells us that she related this vision to a cousin of the deceased, who was likewise given to the illusions of worldly vanity. The cousin was so struck that she renounced the luxuries and dangerous amusements of the world, and devoted the remainder of her life to penance in an austere religious order.

Let us relate still another example of the chastisements reserved for worldlings in Purgatory:

Blessed Mary Villani, a Dominican Religious, (Sa Vie, by Marchi, i. 2, c. 5; Merveilles, 41), had a lively devotion to the holy souls, and it often happened that they appeared to her, either to thank her or to beg the assistance of her prayers and good works. One day, whilst praying for them with great fervor, she was transported in spirit to their prison of expiation. Among the souls that suffered there she saw one more cruelly tormented than the others, in the midst of flames which entirely enveloped her. Touched with compassion, the servant of God interrogated the soul. “I have been here,” she replied, “for a very long time, punished for my vanity and my scandalous extravagance. Thus far I have not received the least alleviation. Whilst I was upon Earth, being wholly occupied with my cosmetics and appearance, my pleasures, and worldly amusements, I thought very little of my duties as a Christian, and fulfilled them only with great reluctance, and in a slothful manner. My only serious thought was to further the worldly interests of my family. See now how I am punished: they bestow not so much as a passing thought upon me: my parents, my children, those friends with whom I was most intimate— all have forgotten me.”

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

I see the souls suffer the pains of Purgatory having before their eyes two works of God.

First, they see themselves suffering pain willingly, and as they consider their own deserts and acknowledge how they have grieved God, it seems to them that He has shown them great mercy, for if His goodness had not tempered justice with mercy, making satisfaction with the precious blood of Jesus Christ, one sin would deserve a thousand perpetual Hells.

And therefore the souls suffer pain willingly, and would not lighten it by one pang, knowing that they most fully deserve it and that it has been well ordained, and they no more complain of God, as far as their will goes, than if they were in eternal life.

The second work they see is the happiness they feel as they contemplate God’s ordinance and the love and mercy with which He works on the soul.

In one instant God imprints these two sights on their minds, and because they are in grace they are aware of these sights and understand them as they are, in the measure of their capacity. Thus a great happiness is granted them which never fails; rather it grows as they draw nearer God.

These souls see these sights neither in nor of themselves but in God, on whom they are far more intent than on the pains they suffer, and of whom they make far greater account, beyond all comparison, than of their pains. For every glimpse which can be had of God exceeds any pain or joy a man can feel. Albeit, however, it exceeds the pain and joy of these souls, it lessens them by not a tittle.

Prayer

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.

LITANY TO OUR LADY, THE HELP OF SOULS IN PURGATORY

NINTH DAY OF THE NOVENA (new meditations posted for each day)
Theme: The Joy of Purgatory

Quotes from Scriptures and Saints:

“We have passed through fire and water, and Thou hast brought us out into a place of refreshment!” (Psalm 65:12).

St. Catherine of Genoa: "I believe that no happiness can be found worthy to be compared with that of the souls in Purgatory except that of the Saints in Paradise. And that day-by-day this happiness grows as God flows into souls. More and more the hindrance to his entrance is consumed, and more and more the soul opens itself up to the divine inflowing."

Reading from "Purgatory Explained" by Fr. Francis Xavier Schouppe, S.J.

God consoles the souls in Purgatory; He Himself consoles them; He also consoles them through the Blessed Virgin and through the holy angels. He consoles the souls by inspiring them with a high degree of Faith, Hope, and Divine Love— virtues which produce in them conformity to the Divine will, resignation, and the most perfect patience. “God,” says St. Catherine of Genoa, “inspires the soul in Purgatory with so ardent a movement of devoted love, that it would be sufficient to annihilate her were she not immortal. Illumined and inflamed by that pure charity, the more she loves God, the more she detests the least stain that displeases Him, the least hindrance that prevents her union with Him. Thus, if she could find another Purgatory more terrible than the one to which she is condemned, that soul would plunge herself therein, impelled by the impetuosity of the love which exists between God and herself, in order that she might be the sooner delivered from all that separates her from her Sovereign God.”

“These souls,” says again the same saint, “are intimately united to the will of God, and so completely transformed into it, that they are always satisfied with its holy ordinances. The souls in Purgatory have no choice of their own; they can no longer will anything than what God wills. They receive with perfect submission all that God gives them; and neither pleasure, nor contentment, nor pain can ever again make them think of themselves.”

St. Magdalen de Pazzi, after the death of one of her brothers, having gone to the choir to offer prayers for him, saw his soul a prey to intense suffering. Touched with compassion, she melted into tears, and cried out in a piteous voice, “Brother, miserable and blessed at the same time! O soul afflicted and yet contented! these pains are intolerable and yet they are endured. Why are they not understood by those here below, who have not the courage to carry their cross? Whilst you were in this world, my dear brother, you would not listen to my advice, and now you desire ardently that I should hear you! O God, equally just and merciful, comfort this brother, who has served you from his infancy! Have regard to your clemency, I beseech you, and make use of your great mercy in his behalf! O God most just, if he has not always been attentive to please you, at least he has not despised those who made profession of serving you with fidelity.”

The day on which she had that wonderful ecstasy, during which she visited the different prisons of Purgatory, seeing again the soul of her brother, she said to him, “Poor soul, how you suffer, and nevertheless you rejoice! You burn and you are satisfied, because you know well that these sufferings must lead you to a great and unspeakable happiness. How happy shall I be, should I never have to endure greater suffering! Remain here, my dear brother, and complete your purification in peace.”

This contentment in the midst of the most intense suffering cannot be explained otherwise than by the Divine consolations which the Holy Ghost infuses into the souls in Purgatory. This Divine Spirit, by means of Faith, hope, and charity, puts them in the disposition of a sick person who has to submit to very painful treatment, but the effect, of which is to restore him to perfect health. This sick person suffers, but he loves his salutary suffering. The Holy Ghost, the Comforter, gives a similar contentment to the Holy Souls.

The Words of St. Catherine of Genoa, from her "Treatise on Purgatory"

This form of purgation, which I see in the souls in Purgatory, I feel in my own mind. In the last two years I have felt it most; every day I feel and see it more clearly. I see my soul within this body as in a Purgatory, formed as is the true Purgatory and like it, but so measured that the body can bear with it and not die little by little it grows until the body die.

I see my spirit estranged from all things, even things spiritual, which can feed it, such as gaiety, delight and consolation, and without the power so to enjoy anything, spiritual or temporal, by will or mind or memory, as to let me say one thing contents me more than another.

Inwardly I find myself as it were besieged. All things by which spiritual or bodily life is refreshed have, little by little, been taken from my inner self, which knows, now they are gone, that they fed and comforted. But so hateful and abhorrent are these things, as they are known to the spirit, that they all go never to return. This is because of the spirit’s instinct to rid itself of whatever hinders its perfection; so ruthless is it that to fulfill its purpose it would all but cast itself into Hell. Therefore it ever deprives the inner man of all on which it can feed, besieging it so cunningly that it lets not the least atom of imperfection pass unseen and unabhorred.

As for my outer ‘man’, it too, since the spirit does not respond to it, is so besieged that it finds nothing to refresh it on the Earth if it follow its human instinct. No comfort is left it, except God, Who works all this by love and very mercifully in satisfaction of His justice. To perceive this gives my outer man great peace and happiness, but happiness which neither lessens my pain, nor weakens the siege. Yet no pain could ever be inflicted on me so great that I would wish to depart from the divine ordinance. I neither leave my prison, nor seek to go forth from it―let God do what is needed! My happiness is that God be satisfied, nor could I suffer a worse pain than that of going outside God’s ordinance, so just I see Him to be and so very merciful.

All these things of which I have spoken are what I see and, as it were, touch, but I cannot find fit words to say as much as I would of them. Nor can I say rightly what I have told of the work done in me, which I have felt spiritually. I have told it however.

The prison in which I seem to myself to be is the world, my chains the body, and it is my soul enlightened by grace which knows the grievousness of being held down or kept back and thus hindered from pursuing its end. This gives my soul great pain for it is very tender. By God’s grace it receives a certain dignity which makes it like unto God; nay, rather He lets it share His goodness so that it becomes one with Him. And since it is impossible that God suffer pain, this immunity too befalls the souls who draw near Him; the nearer they come to Him, the more they partake of what is His.

Therefore to be hindered on its way, as it is, causes the soul unbearable pain. The pain and the hindrance wrest it from its first natural state, which by grace is revealed to it, and finding itself deprived of what it is able to receive, it suffers a pain more or less great according to the measure of its esteem for God. The more the soul knows God, the more it esteems Him and the more sinless it becomes, so that the hindrance in its way grows yet more terrible to it, above all because the soul which is unhindered and wholly recollected in God knows Him as He truly is.

As the man who would let himself be killed rather than offend God feels death and its pain, but is given by the light of God a zeal which causes him to rate divine honor above bodily death, so the soul who knows God’s ordinance rates it above all possible inner and outer torments, terrible though they may be, for this is a work of God who surpasses all that can be felt or imagined. Moreover God when He occupies a soul, in however small a degree, keeps it wholly busied over His Majesty so that nothing else counts for it. Thus it loses all which is its own, and can of itself neither see nor speak nor know loss or pain. But, as I have already said clearly, it knows all in one instant when it leaves this life.

Finally and in conclusion, let us understand that God who is best and greatest causes all that is of man to be lost, and that Purgatory cleanses it away.

Prayer

[Mention Your Intention]

Pray:
Our Father, Hail Mary, De Profundis (see below)

Out of the depths I call to Thee, O Lord. O Lord, listen to my cry. Be attentive to the sound of my pleading. If Thou, Lord, note all our offences, who then, O Lord, could stand? But with Thee is forgiveness, for which we revere Thee. I wait for the Lord, my soul awaits; I hope in His word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for dawn. More than watchmen awaiting the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy and generous redemption. It is He who redeems Israel from all their sins.

Final Invocation:
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace! Amen.