The Christophers: Mercy Raises Man Above His Weakness

Fr. Ed Dougherty,

M.M., The Christophers’ Board of Directors

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On June 7, 1997, Pope Saint John Paul II visited the Shrine of Divine Mercy in Krakow, Poland. There, he stated, “Those who sincerely say, ‘Jesus, I trust in You’ will find comfort in all their anxieties and fears. 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.”

As we move through these early days of the Easter Season, united in joy over the miracle of the Resurrection, it is fitting that our Second Sunday of Easter should be Divine Mercy Sunday because Divine Mercy is the great fruit of Christ’s sacrifice.

John Paul II elevated this devotion because he had such a keen understanding of the spirituality of Saint Faustina Kowalska, who died in Krakow in 1938, the very same year that he, as then 18-year-old Karol Wojtyla, moved to that city with his father.

Karol’s mother had died of a heart attack when he was just eight years old, and his sister died before he was even born. His older brother Edmund succumbed to scarlet fever when Karol was just 12 years old. Edmund was a physician who contracted scarlet fever after treating those suffering from the illness.

Karol’s father died of a heart attack just three years after they moved to Krakow. Later, as pope, he recalled that time in his life, saying, “At twenty, I had already lost all the people I loved.”

Acquaintance with loss prepared young Karol for the specter of war looming in Europe. But Karol was also acquainted with hope, and he was prepared to respond to the tragedy of World War II with bold action. He defied the Nazis by entering the clandestine underground seminary, even while he fulfilled their mandatory labor requirement by working in a quarry. It was during this time that he learned of Faustina’s writings, which led to his devotion to Divine Mercy. It was a devotion that planted a seed of hope inspiring him to continue to defy the Nazis by protecting many Jewish people. That devotion also later inspired him to become a brave voice in Poland’s struggle for religious freedom behind the Iron Curtain of Russian communism.

When he became pope, John Paul II spoke of the importance of Divine Mercy to his pontificate, saying, “Right from the beginning of my ministry in St. Peter’s See in Rome, I considered this message my special task. Providence has assigned it to me in the present situation of man, the Church and the world. It could be said that precisely this situation assigned that message to me as my task before God.”

Saint Faustina’s profound mystical experiences led her to reveal the vital importance of God’s mercy, which inspired young Karol Wojtyla, who carried his first-hand knowledge of the power of mercy into a pontificate that amplified the message of Divine Mercy.

That message is a continuum tracing directly to Christ and His Resurrection. It falls to us now to pick up the mantle. Each one of us, in our own time, is called to follow in the footsteps of saints like Faustina and John Paul II and all those who have raised up the message announcing that God’s mercy is triumphant and extends to the farthest reaches of creation and the deepest recesses of each soul.

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