St. Catherine of Genoa: Treatise on Purgatory

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Treatise on Purgatory
by St. Catherine of Genoa


Translated from the original Italian

With a Preface by His Eminence Cardinal Manning

"In iis quæ de Purgatorio determinata non sunt ab Ecclesia standum est iis quae sunt magis conformia dictis et revelationibus Sanctorum." — St. Thomas, in 4 sent. dist. 21, quæst. 1, a. 1; quoted by Bellarmine, lib. ii., c. vii., de Purg.


Fourth Edition

London: Burns & Oates, Ltd.
New York, Cincinnati, Chicago: Benziger Bros.



Preface to the First Edition

The Treatise of St. Catherine of Genoa on Purgatory has never, it seems, been as yet rendered into English. The present translation, therefore, which is both faithful and excellent in language, will be most acceptable to those to whom this wonderful book has hitherto been closed.

Although Our Lord, by His Apostle, has forbidden to women the public ministry of teaching in His Church, He has nevertheless reserved for them a great and resplendent office in the edification of His mystical Body. The lights and inspirations bestowed upon them, according to the words of the prophet Joel — "In the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy; . . . and upon My servants and upon My handmaidens I will pour out in those days of My Spirit" — are among the prerogatives bestowed upon the Church by the day of Pentecost; and their dignity is among the glories of the Mother of God, whose daughters and handmaids they are.

Two of the great festivals of the Catholic Church had their origin in the illumination of humble and unlearned women. The Feast of Corpus Christi was the offspring of the devotion of the Blessed Juliana of Retinne; the Feast of the Sacred Heart of that of the Blessed Margaret Mary; to St. Catherine of Sienna Our Lord vouchsafed the honour of calling back again the Sovereign Pontiff from the splendid banishment of Avignon to the throne of the Apostolic See; to St. Teresa the special gift of illumination, to teach the ways of union with Himself in prayer; to Blessed Angela of Foligno the eighteen degrees of compunction, and His own five poverties; and to St. Catherine of Genoa an insight and perception of the state of purgatory, which seem like the utterances of one immersed in its expiation of love.

Benedict XIV tells us, in his work on the Beatification and Canonisation of Saints, that the works of St. Catherine of Genoa were examined and approved by the theologians of Paris: intending, no doubt, the examination by the Sorbonne in 1666, by direction of the Archbishop of Paris; and again by the Sacred Congregation in the cause of her canonisation.[^1] The source from which she drew the sweet and consoling illumination set forth in the following pages, on the mysterious sufferings and bliss of purgatory, was a life of continued pain and of ardent consuming love; of perpetual expiation, and of absolute conformity to the will of God. And of this she says:

"This way of purgation which I see in the souls in purgatory, I feel in my own mind, chiefly in the last two years; day by day I feel and see it more clearly. I see my soul to be standing in the body as in a purgatory conformed and like to the true purgatory. . . . All the things I have hitherto said I see and touch; but I can find no fit words to express as fully as I desire to say it; and what I have said I feel to be working spiritually within me, and therefore I have said it."[^2]

The Saint was born in Genoa, in 1447, of the family of Fieschi. Her parents married her to Giuliano Adorno, of a noble Genoese house. After his death she served the sick in the Great Hospital, where her body, still perfect and visible, is venerated over the high altar in the choir of the religious which is attached to the wards, and looks down upon the external Church; and her memory is blessed among the Saints as the Seraph of Genoa.

H. E. Manning
All Souls Day, 1858



[^1]: Ben. XIV. *de Beat, et Can. Sanct.* lib. ii. c. xxvi. 2
[^2]: *Trattato del Purgatorio*, c. xvii.

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The Saint shows how she understood Purgatory from the Divine fire which she felt within herself, and in what manner the souls there are both happy and tormented.


Chapter I.  State of the Souls in Purgatory: How They Are Free From All Self-Love

This holy soul, yet in the flesh, found herself placed in the purgatory of God's burning love, which consumed and purified her from whatever she had to purify, in order that after passing out of this life she might enter at once into the immediate presence of God her Beloved. By means of this furnace of love she understood how the souls of the faithful are placed in purgatory to get rid of all the rust and stain of sin that in this life was left unpurged. As she, plunged in the Divine furnace of purifying love, was united to the object of her love, and satisfied with all that He wrought in her, so she understood it to be with the souls in purgatory, and said: —

The souls in purgatory, as far as I can understand the matter, cannot but choose to be there; and this by God's ordinance, Who has justly decreed it so. They cannot reflect within themselves and say, "I have done such and such sins, for which I deserve to be here;" nor can they say, "Would that I had not done them, that now I might go to Paradise;" nor yet say, "That soul is going out before me;" nor, "I shall go out before him." They can remember nothing of themselves or others, whether good or evil, which might increase the pain they ordinarily endure; they are so completely satisfied with what God has ordained for them, that He should be doing all that pleases Him, and in the way it pleases Him, that they are incapable of thinking of themselves even in the midst of their greatest sufferings. They behold only the goodness of God, whose mercy is so great in bringing men to Himself, that they cannot see anything that may affect them, whether good or bad; if they could, they would not be in pure charity. They do not know that their sufferings are for the sake of their sins, nor can they keep in view the sins themselves;[^3] for in doing so there would be an act of imperfection, which could have no place where there can be no longer any possibility of actually sinning.

Once, in passing out of this life, they perceive why they have their purgatory; but never afterwards, otherwise self would come in. Abiding, then, in charity, and not being able to deviate therefrom by any real defect, they have no will, no desire, nothing but the will of pure love; they are in that fire of purgatory by the appointment of God, which is all one with pure love; and they cannot in anything turn aside from it, because, as they can no more merit, so they can no more sin.