This morning at six o’clock I received a vision which will, at least in part, leave some incredulous, but for me it was a comfort and also an affliction.
I saw most lofty Paradise, with its people of Saints. Innumerable, festive, and blessed in the contemplation of God. Lights and lights of loving flames were the extremely white spirits absorbed in the vision of God. With their faces and their love, all of them were focused upon a single point: the Most Holy Trinity.
But, on the border, shall we say, of Heaven, precisely in the place where the blessed Kingdom began, a spirit appeared that was different in appearance and attitude. The appearance was less dazzling in its whiteness, the face, too, a bit duller - I would say ashen gray - though it already had the characteristics of the blessed spirits: lines of light in the form of a countenance and members. And the robe, too, though white, was not yet shining light turned into cloth, like that of the others. It seemed to have just emerged from a sad, nebulous place which had weighed down its robe and color. The attitude was also different from that of the others. Torn between wanting to worship God and wanting to look at me, with a strange glance, it seemed to be asking for forgiveness, saying, “Now I know”; “I love you”; “Thank you”; and “I was blind, and now I see.” I don’t know - a serious, almost sad appearance, and yet peaceful and serene. A humble and yet solemn appearance....
It was my mother. Her likeness and expression, which reflected the rare moments in which she had made her heart and reason speak, were so exact as to be unmistakable. I eagerly searched for my father. But I did not see him. And yet I think he is more deeply in God than Mother is....769 I searched for him so much among the very clear, recognizable faces of the blessed! My joy would have been complete. Though it was indeed a joy to have seen her, my mother, for whom I prayed so much during her life and after her death.
I think - I don’t know whether my idea is true - she has just come out of expiation or that she is right on the threshold, on the border between Purgatory and Paradise, and for this reason is less brilliant and less absorbed in God than the others, still needing to recall the earth and feeling an impulse coming from her rebirth into Perfection: to tell me now what she never felt the need to tell me, not even on her last day, and to make reparation for so much self-enclosed, proud egotism. I know that those who knew her will not believe in such a rapid expiation. But I think Jesus wanted me to know this in order to be less desolate. I take delight in recalling what I have seen and bless the Lord for it.770
769 See notes 465 and 466.
770 There follows on November 2 the episode involving “The Possessed Man from Capernaum Healed in the Synagogue,” found in the cycle on The First Year of the Public Life.