Divine Mercy
April 16, 2023
Jesus Christ is Risen – Alleluia, Alleluia!
Most of us are aware of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. We’ve been praying it every Friday in the church at 3pm for years, and I’m sure you’ve heard it sung or said if you’ve ever listened to a Catholic radio station. The most famous author and voice of the sung version (in English), Donna Cori Gibson, was here Palm Sunday and blessed us with a concert. It is a very popular devotion, one worth learning and using.
In the 1930’s Jesus began to visit a Polish nun named Faustina Kowalska (a canonized saint now) and passed on to her a series of messages that she recorded in her diary which has become a book called: Divine Mercy in My Soul. It’s a book about God’s abiding presence and love for us; as well as an underlying warning to turn away from sin and to turn to the infinite mercy of God. This theme of mercy pervades Jesus’ messages to St. Faustina, yet the message of God’s mercy is as old as the Bible itself, and the Church has been proclaiming it for 2000 years. However, Our Lord has made a very special point of emphasizing His mercy to us in the past century through St. Faustina. This begs the question: why did Jesus wait so long? Why did He wait until the 20th century to find a saint to pass along this very special message of His mercy? By comparison, intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary through the Rosary, was given to St. Dominic by the Blessed Virgin Mary in the early 13th Century, eight centuries ago. The answer to this question lies in our age/generation/epoch of time.
God has allowed our age to stray far from Him (He’s got His reasons). The vast majority of the human race no longer acknowledges its creator and sustainer, God, let alone its Savior – Jesus Christ. Things that almost all people knew were sins and shunned in past centuries are now celebrated. Ignorance and defiance of God and His laws are so great today, that if the normal rules of culpability found in past ages were applied to us today, the vast majority of the human race would be lost forever. For these reasons, Christ has chosen unprecedented mercy (unjust mercy if you will) to save souls that in other generations would have been damned for sins we indifferently engage in today. Think of our age as having a special dispensation from heaven; and that dispensation is unprecedented mercy: “. . . but despite the increase in sin, grace has far surpassed it.” (Rm 5:20). It won’t be like this forever, the clock on God’s mercy will naturally turn into His justice (a super good thing too), it always does. During this time of transition from the godless and wicked age that we live in now, to the God fearing and God loving age to come, we have Christ’s mercy found in the chaplet that He gave to St. Faustina. Another powerful prayer from heaven for our protection, conversion and salvation, and that of others.
Today, the Sunday after Easter, is called Divine Mercy Sunday. Meditate on Our Lord’s mercy and thank Him for it. Pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy today for yourself and others (come to the Church at 3pm and pray with us!). If you don’t know it, pick up a “how to” guide from the literature rack in the narthex. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Jesus.
In Christ, the Just and Merciful Redeemer,
Fr. Thomas Nathe
