Divine Mercy was a Feast the Pope instituted on the Sunday after Easter because he believed its spirituality of love could transform the world.
So this message was delivered posthumously:
“To humanity, which at times seems lost and dominated by the power of evil, of egoism and of fear, the Lord rises again to offer the gift of his love that forgives, reconciles and reopens the soul to hope. It is a love that changes the heart and bestows peace. How much the world needs to comprehend and embrace the divine mercy.”
“Comprehend the Divine Mercy…”
I doubt whether the media will pay much attention to this message, but it’s well-known that John Paul II, with his encyclical “Dives in Misericordia” will surely go down in Church History as “The Mercy Pope.”
So what did he mean by “comprehend ‘the Divine Mercy’”?
The Pope was profoundly impacted by the work of a young nun, Saint Faustina Helena Kowalska, who was born in the village of Glogowiec west of Lodz, Poland, on August 25, 1905. The 3rd of 10 children, when she was twenty when she entered the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, whose members devote themselves to the care and education of troubled young women.
Saint Faustina
As the story goes, it was in 1931 that our Lord appeared to Saint Faustina in a vision as she was walking in the convent garden. She saw a Jesus, who appeared as he was when he was raised from the dead, clothed in a white garment with His right hand raised in blessing. His left hand was touching His garment in the area of the heart, from where two large rays came forth, one red and the other pale. Jesus said to her:
“Paint an image according to the pattern you see with the signature: Jesus, I trust in You … I promise that the soul that will venerate this image will not perish. [...] I am offering people a vessel with which they are to keep coming for graces to the fountain of mercy.”
At the request of her spiritual director, Saint Faustina asked the Lord about the meaning of the rays in the image. She heard these words in reply:
“The two rays denote Blood and Water. The pale ray stands for the Water which makes souls righteous. The red ray stands for the Blood which is the life of souls. These two rays issued forth from the depths of My tender mercy when My agonized Heart was opened by a lance on the Cross … Happy is the one who will dwell in their shelter, for the just hand of God shall not lay hold of him.”
“How much the world needs to comprehend and embrace the Divine Mercy…,”
Indeed.
In The Merchant of Venice, Portia illustrates how we, when we are merciful, can be most like our Father in Heaven.
“The quality of mercy is not strain’d,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice.”
– Portia, The Merchant of Venice, IV.i.179–192
So perhaps being merciful is one of the easiest, most accessible, ways for us humans to “Be perfect, as [our] Father in Heaven is Perfect.”
Would that it were that our leaders be merciful as a conditioned response, because it shows empathy for another’s pain and compassion for another’s suffering.
Ocean of Mercy
By the way, one of the greatest CDs you’ll ever listen to is “Ocean of Mercy” by Michael John Poirier. I highly recommend it.
