Divine Mercy Sunday, the Pope & St. Faustina.

On the Second Sunday of Easter of the Jubilee Year 2000, at the Mass for the canonization of St. Faustina Kowalska, Pope John Paul II proclaimed to the world that "from now on throughout the Church" this Sunday will be called "Divine Mercy Sunday." Many of the Church's pastors and liturgists were taken by surprise by this announcement. Some wondered: "Why is the Holy Father doing this? Is he simply creating a new feast because of the private revelations given to the Polish mystic St. Faustina Kowalska?"

To be sure, the Holy Father was well aware that the visions of Christ received by St. Faustina, and the messages and disciplines flowing from them, remain in the category of private revelations. The Church's doctrine of Divine Mercy and her liturgical practices are not based on St. Faustina's revelations: they are based on Holy Scripture, the faith handed down by the apostles, and on liturgical traditions rooted in the worship life of the ancient, apostolic communities. St. Faustina's revelations add nothing new to this deposit of Faith, nor anything novel to the official liturgy of the Church. Moreover, it is also true that the Holy See did not establish "Divine Mercy Sunday" to commemorate St. Faustina's mystical experiences. Thus, it remains true that no one is required by the Holy See, on Mercy Sunday, to pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, or venerate the image of the Divine Mercy, or do anything else that springs from St. Faustina's revelations. No priest could be called a "heretic," or in any way disobedient to liturgical law, for ignoring these things entirely. Nevertheless, what makes St. Faustina's revelations striking is the way that they so powerfully express the central truths that lie at the heart of the Gospel: the merciful love of God, manifest especially in the Passion and Resurrection of His Son. Indeed, some of the devotional forms which spring from her "private revelations" (such as the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, and the veneration of the image of the Divine Mercy) are especially vivid ways of contemplating the Paschal Mystery: the Mystery which lies at the very heart of the "public revelation" passed down to us from the apostles, as well as at the very heart of the ancient liturgical traditions for the Easter Octave.

In short, what is not required--i.e., not a matter of law or precept--can still be a matter of good counsel. Given the fact that our chief shepherd and pastor, Pope John Paul II, has strongly encouraged the whole, universal Church, on several occasions, to pay heed to the messages and revelations given to St. Faustina as a special call to our time to turn back to the God of merciful love--and given that the Pope has also recommended both the image and the chaplet as helpful means to that end--it would surely be rash and imprudent to ignore those exhortations from the Vicar of Christ.

Just listen to what the Holy Father said about all this at St. Faustina's tomb in Lagiewniki, Poland, in 1997:

"There is nothing that man needs more than Divine Mercy--that love which is benevolent, which is compassionate, which raises man above his weakness to the infinite heights of the holiness of God.

"In this place we become particularly aware of this. From here, in fact, went out the message of Divine Mercy that Christ Himself chose to pass on to our generation through Blessed Faustina.

"And it is a message that is clear and understandable for everyone. Anyone can come here, look at this image of the merciful Jesus, His Heart radiating grace, and hear in the depths of his own soul what Blessed Faustina heard: 'Fear nothing. I am with you always' (Diary, 586).

"And if this person responds with a sincere heart, 'Jesus, I trust in you,' he will find comfort in all his anxieties and fears."

Again the Holy Father, in his homily on Mercy Sunday, 2001, said:

"We are celebrating the Second Sunday of Easter, which, since last year, the year of the Great Jubilee, is also called "Divine Mercy Sunday." It is a great joy for me to be able to join all of you, dear pilgrims and faithful who have come here from various nations to commemorate, after one year, the canonization of Sr Faustina Kowalska, witness and messenger of the Lord's merciful love. The elevation to the honours of the altar of this humble religious is not only a gift for Poland, but for all humanity. Indeed the message she brought is the appropriate and incisive answer that God wanted to offer to the questions and expectations of human beings in our time, marked by terrible tragedies. Jesus said to Sr. Faustina one day: 'Humanity will not have peace until it turns with trust to Divine Mercy' (Diary, 300). Divine Mercy! This is the Easter gift that the Church receives from the risen Christ and offers to humanity at the dawn of the third millennium....

"Today the Lord also shows us His glorious wounds and His heart, an inexhaustible source of light and truth, of love and forgiveness.... St. Faustina saw coming from this Heart that was overflowing with generous love, two rays of light which illuminated the world. 'The two rays,' according to what Jesus Himself told her, 'represent the blood and the water' (Diary, 299). The blood recalls the sacrifice of Golgotha, and the mystery of the Eucharist; the water, according to the rich symbolism of the Evangelist St. John, makes us think of Baptism and the Gift of the Holy Spirit (cf. Jn 3:5; 4:14).

"Through the mystery of this wounded heart, the restorative tide of God's merciful love continues to spread over the men and women of our time. Here alone can those who long true and lasting happiness its secret."

Why did the Pope so strongly recommend that we pay heed to the Divine Mercy message and devotion--even the Image and the Chaplet--given to us through St. Faustina? Clearly, he does so because he sees all this as more than just a collection of "private revelations;" rather, he sees them as prophetic revelations, in other words revelations given to us by God to proclaim the heart of the Gospel--the merciful love of God shining through the death, burial and resurrection of his Son--in a way especially suited to meet the needs of our era. The liturgy for the Easter Octave, therefore, and for the Octave Sunday itself, is not something that needs to be "protected" or "sealed off" from the alien influence of the "private revelations" of a Polish nun. On the contrary, the celebration of Mercy Sunday should open to all the enhancement and amplification of the message of merciful love which prudent use of her devotions can bring to it....

As many commentators have pointed out, the Second Sunday of Easter was already a solemnity as the Octave Day of Easter; nevertheless, the title "Divine Mercy Sunday" does highlight and amplify the meaning of the day. In this way, it recovers an ancient liturgical tradition, reflected in a teaching attributed to St. Augustine about the Easter Octave, which he called "the days of mercy and pardon," and the Octave Day itself "the compendium of the days of mercy." Moreover, the title "Divine Mercy Sunday" expresses the message of the prayers and readings traditionally appointed for this Octave Day. Liturgically the day has always been centred on the theme of Divine mercy and forgiveness. That is why, in its decree establishing Divine Mercy Sunday, the Holy See insisted that the texts already assigned for that day in the Missal and the Liturgy of the Hours of the Roman Rite "are always to be used for the liturgical celebration of this Sunday."

Given the liturgical appropriateness of the title "Divine Mercy Sunday" for the Octave Day of Easter, therefore, the Holy See did not give this title to the Second Sunday of Easter merely as an "option," for those dioceses which happen to like that sort of thing! Rather, the decree issued on May 5, 2000, by the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship and The Discipline of the Sacraments clearly states: "The Supreme Pontiff John Paul II has graciously determined that in the Roman Missal, after the title Second Sunday of Easter, there shall henceforth be added the appellation 'or [that is] Divine Mercy Sunday' ..." Divine Mercy Sunday, therefore, is the second name for this Feast Day. In a similar way, the Octave Day of the Nativity of Our Lord was named by the Church "The Feast of the Mother of God."

This means that preaching on God's mercy is also not just an option for the clergy on that day--it is strongly encouraged. To fail to preach on God's mercy on that day would mean largely to ignore the prayers, readings, and psalms appointed for that day, as well as the title "Divine Mercy Sunday" now given to that day in the Roman Missal.

Clearly, the celebration of Mercy Sunday does not compete with, nor endanger the integrity of the Easter Season.

Sometimes the fear is expressed that the recitation of St. Faustina's Novena of Chaplets of the Divine Mercy from Good Friday until Mercy Sunday distracts us from the focus of the liturgy. But the Chaplet of Divine Mercy is an intercessory prayer on the basis of the Passion of Christ, and the Image of the Divine Mercy (before which the Novena is usually recited) is primarily a manifestation of the Risen Christ. The Novena of Chaplets (with the Image), therefore, focuses our minds and hearts on the Paschal Mystery--the death and resurrection of Christ. Nothing could be more appropriate at this time in the liturgical year! In a similar way, reciting the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday, and the Tre Ore devotions, which often include meditations on the seven last words of Christ--while in no way required by the Missal--are good liturgical customs that amplify the meaning of this important time in the Church's liturgical year. They do not compete with, nor distract from, the official liturgy for Good Friday.

Sometimes the fear is expressed that the prominence of the Easter Candle as the chief visual symbol of Christ risen and living among us might be reduced by the display and veneration of the Image of the Divine Mercy on Mercy Sunday. But no such competition exists. The Paschal Candle is a symbol of the risen Christ. The Image of the Divine Mercy, on the other hand, is an icon or holy image, a pictorial representation of the risen Christ. As such, it is helpful to us in a different way. In a sense, we direct our prayers through an icon to the person they represent (Catechism, 2132, quoting St. Thomas Aquinas: "The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is"). We do not, however, generally use symbols, such as the Easter Candle, in quite the same way. In other words, the Easter Candle is an ancient and abiding symbol of the presence of the risen Christ, living among us, while the icon manifests, in particular, the personal and merciful love of the risen Christ for us, and thereby elicits a response of trust and of prayer.

In short, what the Holy Father has done by establishing "Divine Mercy Sunday" is not create an alternate theme or celebration for the Easter Season. All he has done is recover an ancient tradition of celebrating the Octave Day of Easter as a summary of the whole Paschal Mystery, and the merciful love of God that shines through that Mystery. The witness of St. Faustina is an aid and not a hindrance to the People of God in their celebration of this great solemnity.

Robert Stackpole, S.T.D., is the Director of the John Paul II Institute of Divine Mercy, and Professor of Theology, Reedemer Pacific College, Langley, B.C.