Never having (knowingly) seen an angel, I couldn’t say.
I have read that if we could “perceive” an angel as it truly is, we would be absolutely convinced it was God, so magnificent are they.
One wonders whether an angel has to take on a visual form to be perceived, or whether it can just cause a visual sensation directly in the brain. One is inclined to think the latter. If so, it can create the impression it wishes to create and as allowed by God.
St. Thomas Aquinas reasoned that an angel is a totally unified being. It does not will one thing and do another. Its decision is its action, and its decision is driven by its nature. At one time, or in some mode of being, their decisionmaking was separated from their nature, but no longer.
We are told that angels have some kind of agency in ordering the universe. One can speculate that perhaps they, or some of them, are entrusted with the very nature of physical action; that is, the principles underlying them. So, for example, might an angel be “in charge” of the mathematical principles governing the internal action of black holes? If they are of that sort, we could probably not “hear” the name of an angel and live; the name of an angel being coextensive with its nature. Every cell in our brains would fire at once trying to take it in, and our hearts would burst with the overwhelming wonder of it.
If one believes such things, one must believe Padre Pio’s “seeing” his angel was perception of an image that was greatly less than the whole.
Thinking about things like that, one then wonders what our perception of God will be like. Being limited beings, we can never fully penetrate God. Eternity would not be enough to do that even if we learned and experienced a thousand lifetimes of learning and experience every second of our lives after death. But we’ll no longer have the filtration that comes with physical bodies and will “expand” like a supernova, spiritually.
A remarkable speculation.
**Padre Pio believed we get a “second chance” at or even after the moment of death, when we see how grave our sins really were. We can then either accept God’s mercy and love or reject it. **Ste. Therese of Lisieux thought the same thing. Hard to believe anyone would reject it, but it’s sort of imaginable if one is utterly devoted to self-worship.
Ste Therese believed all in hell volunteered for it; that is, choosing self-worship and self-absorption for all eternity. We would nevertheless be aware of what that choice entailed, including the loss, and that’s why we will hate God. Most of all, we will hate Him for his mercy and love because of the affront it will seem to one who thinks of himself as sufficient for himself. If the self is supreme, then penance is impossible.
