Our Lady Descends into Purgatory… To lead souls to Heaven

When the Queen of Heaven enters purgatory, everything changes. In this powerful Catholic reflection, discover the vision of St. Frances of Rome, who witnessed Our Lady descending into purgatory to lead suffering souls into the joy of heaven.

Transcript

what will it be like the moment your soul enters heaven

St Frances of Rome had a vision first she saw hell then she saw purgatory but now she sees heaven and it begins with our lady descending on a cloud of golden light crowned with stars more radiant than the sun more serene than the moon she enters into purgatory not to weep but to lead souls home and as each soul rises heaven bursts into song because this is what we are made for welcome back uh today is our third day about heaven mhm so this is exciting i was actually just talking to my friend and she was just saying she was just relieved to know that we will recognize to some degree our loved ones in heaven yeah if you haven't seen the first two on heaven they're I've really personally benefited a lot from the content from St Catherine of Sienna and her conversation with God the Father so check those out as well i'll put them in the link of the description but today we're looking at St Frances of Rome if you recall St Frances had already visions in our previous videos of hell then it was purgatory and now it is heaven but before we get to our visions here's a question for you how many hours do you think it takes for us to do these videos we were talking with uh Matthew who's behind the cameras here today he helps us with the editing and we calculated that it takes 16 to 18 hours per episode from start to finish to get this to you and the reason why we want to share that with you with you is because sometimes people don't realize the work that goes behind the scenes and we want to point out how necessary it is on our side to have supporters to come alongside of us and say "Hey we want to help you in your mission." The mission by the way is to proclaim the beauty of the Catholic faith to a hurting world and we thank you so much for those of you who support us and if there's anyone out there who would like to join us in our mission to be a supporter and a helper in this you can head over to kenjanel.com you know we are we're a small little service to the church there's Janelle and I and now we have Matthew behind the camera so every contribution really does make a difference and so could I ask you would you be willing and able to make a contribution of $10 a month that really does make a difference in our side uh because you know you give to a bigger ministry well $10 a month you got multi-million dollar company there you don't really see it but it's just us $10 a month really does make a difference and so we would ask if you could consider that we'd be very very grateful so to St francis of Rome the first thing she sees of her vision of heaven actually begins in purgatory she descends into purgatory to get souls to bring to heaven st francis's spiritual director relates St francis's account the glorious queen of heaven would descend on a cloud of golden light she was robed in a garment of azure blue which glimmered like a sapphire and upon her head she wore her 12 starred crown of celestial majesty her beauty was such that Francis could find no words to describe it but which simultaneously far exceeded both the radiance of the noon tied sun in all its splendor and the serenity of the moon as it floats through a tranquil sky have you noticed something about how people describe Mary as as far as I can tell all the readings that I've ever done all the visionaries of people who say they've seen Mary or the saints who have these visions no one has ever said Mary is ugly not one in fact it's the opposite every single one that I have ever read talks about this extraordinary beauty a beauty that's hard to describe so it made me wonder like why is she so beautiful what is it about Mary that takes the breath away that her beauty is beyond description and then I looked and I thought well maybe it's a number of different things now I'm no theologian but this is just my meditation on it scripture tells us and the church teaches that she's full of grace grace makes things beautiful grace makes things what they ought to be and so it it reflects God so maybe that that's one reason why she's so beautiful another reason well she's conceived without sin sin is ugly it it mars things it destroys things it leads to death there's nothing beautiful about sin so when you're conceived without sin you're beautiful and the other thing I thought about Mary is that in everything she did she did the will of God her every thought her every word her whole entire being sought to be conformed totally and completely to the will of God and and she was perfected in all the virtues as well and so therefore if you look at the life of Mary we can say she's reflecting God and who is God well he's beautiful so if everything in your life is reflecting God you're reflecting the beautiful one and so Mary's life is beautiful because she's reflecting God in fact in fact she acts like a mirror of beauty st alfonsus says "For she looked upon nothing but God in order to conform always to the divine will." And so always being conformed to the divine will she reflects the beauty of God so now we have our beautiful lady descending into purgatory to get a soul who has finished its time in purgatory as blessed Mary together with the soul passed through the various angelic choirs there would be immense joy and jubilation breaking out at the sight of another one of the beloved children of God being taken to its blessed and everlasting homeland but the greatest rejoicing took place in the choir to which the soul was assigned as its destination in that celestial choir there would be a great festivity of exaltation and holy mirth first question what is mirth said in the footnote that it's actually gladness accompanied by laughter so when I think about this I think it's wonderful meditation what is it like to be taken from purgatory into heaven i never thought of maybe our lady being part of that process and journey taking a soul individually this is what St into heaven and that they pass through the choirs of angels first of all just brings us to the attention that we could see choirs of angels and that we pass through these choirs of angels to be designated to the spot with the angels that we have merited and that there's great rejoicing amongst those uh I think just a beautiful thought to place our minds upon sometimes in life have you ever just felt like you need a win nothing seems to be going your way maybe you've lived a life that is full of unmet expectations no you you you're okay but you know what that bar that you initially had for life you haven't quite hit yet and you haven't been a ever been able to turn a corner and you're like "Yes." Now some of you have wonderful but there's most of the time life um doesn't fulfill all our expectations and sometimes we go through all of life this way so here is the big one the big celebration can you imagine this celebration but it's not just once and done as our celebrations are are in life here we have the eternal celebration the eternal win the eternal joy and would it not be worth it to miss out on all the earthly celebrations if we knew that there was the big celebration at the end because all our earthly celebrations are really finite aren't they you blow out the candles on the cake and then the candles are out until the next year there's not a continuous celebration heaven one continuous joy one continuous fulfillment of all desire now imagine being St francis of Rome how would you respond after what you had just seen well we know how St francis of Rome responded because he her spiritual director recorded it her face would begin to glow as if set a flame with celestial fire this came about particularly when she called to mind the ineffable sweetness of the singing of the angels together with the chorus of the souls of the blessed for the pure and maleifluous harmonies of the eternal hymn of praise exceeded all that the human mind could grasp or imagine when Francis recollected this and attempted to describe it it was as if her soul would melt with ecstatic joy like a piece of soft wax liquefying in the warming presence of some heavenly fire the sounds of heaven that's something I haven't considered before what does it sound like when the choirs of angels and all the saints give glory and praise to God um not one i don't think we'll be out of tune because we're made for communion means harmony everything working together uh I have done a lot of music in the past and I can tell you it is and it's an aggravating thing when you're playing in a band and one of the band members's guitar might be out of tune or the the vocals are are a little bit flat you know one way that Janelle and I met was doing a lot of music and one thing I appreciate about you Janelle is you were always on pitch it was me that would go off but it it ruins everything when one is off it ruins the whole thing in heaven there's nothing there's no imperfection there is no sin there sin is not allowed to come into heaven and so everything in heaven works together for the glory of God beautiful now St francis goes on to say that she has trouble describing what she saw because it's beyond comprehension uh she did describe hell a little bit this way that we she was seeing things u with images but they represented spiritual realities but here we have her struggle unable to communicate the actual beauty which leads us to conclude our best shot at imagining heaven falls short of the reality heaven has been described some by some as a heavenly banquet imagine that you're an owner of a horse and you invite your horse over to your house for a banquet now that horse imagined it has reason and so it can respond it has free will oh the horse says "I I've been invited by my master to a banquet." What What is it expecting when it comes over to your house well the horse is expecting what has previously shaped its experience of eating so the banquet in the horse's mind oats barley hay some water because that is what it's at eaten before and this is what it's going to expect at the banquet at your house doesn't that fall short of our great banquetss no uh filet mano no baked potato with chives and bacon bits and sour cream no garlic stuffed mushrooms a nice Caesar salad with croutons on the side uh no nice red wine the horse is really missing out our notion of the heavenly banquet is of oats and hay and barley compared to the eternal weight of glory that God has prepared for us St Frances' spiritual director relates St Frances's experience of heaven the beatific vision itself which is the experience of gazing upon the highest mystery and glory of the divine trinity was received in varying ways in the different choirs of angels and different ranks of the saints for those who were higher and exalted enjoyed this wonderful vision with greater clarity and completeness according to their rank and station and the souls of those saints who had been more distinguished in merits and virtue during their earthly lives possessed more capacious and subtle powers of perception and comprehension in heaven and could therefore enjoy the beatific vision there more fully and gloriously an important thing to realize here St Frances is saying those who had a greater degree of virtue in their earthly life experience a fuller degree of that beatific vision enjoy a greater fullness of joy with that now in a in a natural life we can understand that when we have a greater understanding of something we are able to enjoy it more fully take for example red wine you have the beginner you have the connoisseur and then you have that professional wine taste tester you know the beginner have a glass of red wine what might they distinguish it's either sweet or dry they might it's like me if you're like I don't know the difference between a good red wine and a not so good red wine and that's how you start off but then but then you have red wine a little bit more often and then you start to be able to identify the flavors the body the minerals the the fruiness the oak it there's a depth all of a sudden that comes to it and you're able to pull that out but then we have the professional taste tester who takes that wine and goes like this and the first thing he does is smells and he gets that aroma and he takes the taste and then he might be able to tell you know even the season those grapes were picked in the location from which they came a professional wine taster can detect a wide range of aromomas including fruits flowers spices and earthy notes simply by smelling the wine when tasting they evaluate sweetness acidity tannins alcohol and how balanced the wine is they can also identify subtle flavor notes and often pinpoint the wine's origin grape variety vintage and even the conditions in which it was made and aged all of which deepen their appreciation and enjoyment of the wine does it make you want to grow an appreciation yeah I can see there's definitely some uh skill to this so this is the point that the professional has put in great discipline to learn more about the wine and therefore he's able to enjoy it in a fuller way you know we're not all going to be professional wine taste testers right that's that's not our calling our calling is to be a great saint and a great saint is one who's put in the discipline and strove in all things to fulfill the will of God and those who have grown in great sanctity and great virtue will experience the beatific vision to a greater degree everything counts in life so strive strive for the fullness by the way this is Pascal he uh just decided to join us at the end hey if you'd like to become again a supporter of our work we greatly appreciate it head over to kenjanel.com and let's end with a prayer

oh my Jesus oh highest good I repent of having so lightly esteemed your grace that I have barted it away for mere nothing when will it be oh Lord that I shall see you face to face and shall embrace you without the fear of ever having to lose you aid me with your grace this I hope for through your merits more and more increase in me your love and the desire to please you amen