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| The Message of Divine Mercy: Trust in Mercy and Be Merciful | |
| The
Message of Divine Mercy is that God is merciful. He is love itself poured
out for us, and He wants noone to escape that merciful love.The message
is that God wants us to turn to Him with trust and repentance while it is
still a time of mercy, before He comes as the just Judge.This turning with
trust to Him who is Mercy itself is the only source of peace for mankind.
Turning to and imploring God's mercy is the answer to the troubled world.
There is no escaping that answer. What God most wants of us is to turn to Him with trust. And the first act of trust is to receive His mercy. To trust God is to rely on Him who is Mercy itself. The Lord wants us to live with trust in Him in all circumstances. We trust Him because He is God, and He loves us and cares for us. |
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| His mercy is always available to us, no matter what we have done or what state we are in, even if our sins are as black as night and we are filled with fears and anxieties. "The greater the sinner, the greater the right he has to my mercy."(Diary of Saint Faustina,723). ….As catholics…we can go to the Sacrament of Reconciliation and be reconciled with Him and one another. | |
| Not only are we to receive His mercy, but we are to use it, being merciful to others by our actions, by our words, and by our prayers;….The message of mercy is the content and the challenge of Sacred Scripture. In the Hebrew Bible we see a God of mercy who calls His people to be merciful. In the New Testament Jesus exhorts us: Be merciful even as your Father is merciful (Lk 6:36 RSV)….Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy (Mt 5:7 RSV).When He comes again, He will judge us on our mercy toward one another: Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of he least of my brethren, you did it to me (Mt 25:40). | |
| The message and response of mercy is not something new. In the past, God spoke a message of mercy through the patriarchs and prophets-through Noah, Abraham, Moses, Elijah and many others….In our century He revealed Himself to Saint Faustina, a simple and holy nun in Poland during the 1930's He called her to be His secretary and His apostle of mercy. He spoke to her of His mercy and the way He wants us to respond to it….She came from a very poor family that had struggled hard on their little farm during the terrible years of World War 1. She had had only three years of very simple education. [As a Sister of Our Lady of Mercy ] hers were the humblest tasks in the convent, usually in the kitchen or vegetable garden, or as porter. | |
| On February 22,1931, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ appeared to this simple nun, bringing with Him a wonderful message of Mercy for all mankind. Through Saint Faustina, Our Lord gave us special means of drawing on His mercy: an Image of The Divine Mercy, a Chaplet of Divine Mercy, a Feast of Mercy, a novena, and prayer at the three o'clock hour- the hour of His death. These special means are in addition to the Sacraments of Eucharist and Reconciliation, which have been given to the Church. | |
| Diary,
St. Maria Faustina Kowalska, Divine Mercy in My Soul (c) 1987 Congregation
of Marians of the Immaculate Conception, Stockbridge, MA 01263. All rights
reserved. Used with permission. |
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