Rich in Mercy       As last Sunday was Divine Mercy Sunday we might take a look at the 1980 encyclical letter of Pope St. John Paul II, Dives in Misericordia , or in English, Rich in Mercy .       St. John Paul II says, “The events of Good Friday and, even before that, in prayer in Gethsemane, introduce a fundamental change into the whole course of the revelation of love and mercy in the messianic mission of Christ.” Christ, who really and terribly suffers, prays to God the Father, the Father of love, but he is not spared from his terrible suffering. As St. Paul says, “For our sake God made him to be sin who knew no sin” (2 Cor. 5:21).       The absolute holiness of God is revealed in the justice required of God’s Son in his passion and death. But precisely there, God’s extraordinary mercy is revealed because this justice now makes possible man’s redemption, restoration to the love of God, adoption as children of God (cf. ...

  Divine Mercy Sunday       St. John Paul II established Divine Mercy Sunday for the entire Church on April 30, 2000, when he canonized St. Mary Faustina Kowalska. At that occasion the former Pope said that by so doing, he intended to pass on the message of Divine Mercy to the new millennium.       He quoted from St. Faustina’s “Diary” of her experience of Jesus speaking to her, “My daughter, say that I am love and mercy personified” (Diary, p. 374), and “Humanity will not find peace until it turns trustfully to divine mercy” (Diary, p. 132).       In regards to proclaiming Divine Mercy Sunday (a feast day Jesus has asked St. Faustina to promote), St. John Paul noted that the present liturgical readings for the day already focus on mercy.  “In the various readings, the liturgy seems to indicate the path of mercy which, while re-establishing the relationship of each person with God, also creates new relations of fraternal s...