St. Faustina's Vision of Hell.

 



Without a doubt, one of the greatest spiritual books that came out of the twentieth century is the Diary of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, "Divine Mercy in My Soul". Faustina was born in Poland on August 25 1905, and died on October 5 1938, she was 33 years old at the time of her death. In 1925 she joined the Congregation of the Sisters of Mercy in Warsaw, and in February 1931 Jesus began to reveal to her His plans to make her His "Secretary of Divine Mercy". She was to be the instrument through which is spread devotion to His Divine Mercy and "You will prepare the world for My final coming" (429) This book is a treasure of mystical experiences, and in it is found the great goodness of God who reveals the depths of His Mercy. "It is a sign of the End Times. After it will come the Day of Justice." (848). Jesus tells Faustina that " In the Old Covenant I sent prophets wielding thunderbolts to My people. Today I am sending you with My Mercy to the people of the whole world. I do not want to punish aching mankind, but I desire to heal it, pressing it to My Merciful Heart. I use punishment when they themselves force me to do so; My hand is reluctant to take hold of the sword of justice. Before the Day of Justice, I am sending the Day of Mercy." (1588) God who loves us warns us and offers us all  the means to return to Him so that He does not have to punish us, "for God did not make death, nor does He rejoice in the death of the living." (Wis. 1:13)

In His Mercy, one day, Jesus showed Faustina a vision of hell so she could tell the people of world to turn to the Mercy of God, so as to avoid going there.

Here is St. Faustina's own testimony.

"Today, I was led by an angel to the Chasms of Hell. It is a place of great torture; how awesomely large and extensive it is! The kinds of tortures I saw:

The First Torture that constitutes hell is:
    The loss of God
The Second is

     Perpetual remorse of conscience.
The Third is
     That one's condition will never change.
The Fourth is
     The fire that will penetrate the soul without destroying it. A terrible suffering since it is a purely spiritual fire, lit by God's anger.

The Fifth is

     Continual darkness and a terrible suffocating smell, and despite the darkness, the devils and the souls of the damned see each other and all the evil, both of others and their own.
The Sixth is
The constant company of Satan.
The Seventh is
Horrible despair, hatred of God, vile words, curses and blasphemies.
These are the tortures suffered by all the damned together, but that is not the end of the suffering There are special tortures destined for particular souls. These are the torments of the senses. Each soul undergoes terrible and indescribable sufferings related to the manner in which it has sinned.
There are caverns and pits of torture where one form of agony differs from another. I would have died at the very sight of these tortures if the omnipotence of God had not supported me.

Let the sinner know that he will be tortured throughout all eternity, in those senses which he made use of to sin. I am writing this at the command of God, so that no soul may find an excuse by saying there is no hell, or that nobody has ever been there, and so no one can say what it is like.

 "I, Sister Faustina Kowalska, by the order of God, have visited the Abysses of Hell so that I might tell souls about it and testify to its existence.I cannot speak about it now; but I have received a command from God to leave it in writing. The devils were full of hatred for me, but they had to obey me at the command of God, What I have written is but a pale shadow of the things I saw. But I noticed one thing: That most of the souls there are those who disbelieved that there is a hell.When I came to, I could hardly recover from the fright .how terribly souls suffer there! Consequently, I pray even more fervently for the conversion of sinners. I incessantly plead God's mercy upon them. O My Jesus, I would rather be in agony until the end of the world, amidst the greatest sufferings, than offend you by the least sin." (Diary 741)