One of the works of Pope John Paul II put in place for our Church is what we celebrate throughout the world. During his homily on the occasion of the canonization of Sister Faustina on April 30, 2000, John Paul spoke these words: It is important then that we accept the whole message that comes to us from the word of God on this Second Sunday of Easter, which from now on throughout the Church will be called "Divine Mercy Sunday."Apparently Jesus appeared to Sister Faustine more than a few times. Now many today are quite skeptical about such events. I will conclude this reflection with a reason for believing such miracles in our own time. But back to the flow of this reflection. In Sister Faustina's diary there are recorded 14 entries concerning Jesus desire that this feast become a reality in the Church. According to what Sister Faustina recorded, Jesus directed her to record his desired intentions for each day of a novena for divine mercy. Furthermore, Sister's diary records these words of Jesus to her: Do all you possible can for this work of mercy. My heart rejoices on account of this feast."
What did this Servant of God, John Paul II, mean when he said that "...we accept the whole message of the 2nd Sunday of Easter." What he meant was this: there is a strict connection between the Easter Mystery of Redemption and this new feast of Divine Mercy. There is to be understood that there is a genuine connection between the suffer, death, burial, resurrection, Ascension and sending of the Holy Spirit with this Sunday that follows Easter Sunday. This is the theme set out in the Responsorial Psalm today: "O give thank to the Lord, for He is good; his streadfast love endures for ever." That steadfast love is nothing else than God's mercy for us.
Three times in her diary Saint Faustina recorded these words of Jesus: (a) I want to grant a complete pardon to the souls that will go to confession and receive Holy Communion on the feast of his mercy;" (b) "Whoever approaches the Fountain of Life on this day will be granted complete forgiveness of sins and punishment;" and (c) "The soul that will go to Confession and received Holy Communion will obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment."
The Eucharist is the Fountain of Life. It is Jesus in his desire to pour himself as Mercy into our hearts. He stresses this attention to the Eucharist because we can so easily receive it with indifference. One of the diary entries follows: "My great delight is to unite Myself with souls .... When I come to a human heart in Holy Communion, My hands are full of all kinds of graces which I want to give to the soul. But souls do not even pay any attention to Me; they leave Me to Myself and busy themselves with other things. Oh, how sad I am that souls do not recognize Love! They treat Me as a dead object."
The promises of complete forgiveness are reminders as well as a call. "He is truly present and truly alive in the Eucharist ... waiting for us to turn to him with trust. The promises are for all of us to experience his cleansing love through Confession and Holy Communion -- to begin our spiritual lives again, renewed and made whole again. Each time we receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation and the Eucharist we accept his offing of a new beginning.
Back to the issue of credibility, of faith in appearances and of miracles accepted by the Church. In December I received a call to come to the Specialty Hospital at 7th and Independence Avenue to anoint a young man. When I arrived, the man's father told me he had had open heart surgery in October. During the operation the man's aorta ruptured. There was no on-the-shelf-aorta waiting for such a rare event. The world-renowned surgeon made an aorta for the man there but it required about 12 minutes ... 12 minutes without the man's brain receiving life-sustaining oxygen. The man was in a coma from that moment on. Several days after my visit with the father and my anointing the man, I returned with a very special mission I felt called to complete because of the extraordinary gift that had been given to me during my days of working with Pope John Paul II. He had entrusted to me one of his zuchettas ... the small skull cap worn by bishops, cardinals and popes. It is a gift that I have guarded and rarely let out of my room. I instructed John's Dad to put the zuchetta on John's head each day and say a prayer to Pope John Paul, requesting his intercession for John. That was in December when the doctors attending John presented his father with a statement that John was now in a permanent, vegetative state. I told John's Dad, "Do not give up." Take this zuchetta to John each day and pray. Now here is the rest of the story. Just three or four weeks ago John's doctors discharged him from the hospital not because there was still no hope but because they now had a patient who came out of a permanent vegetative state and was actually trying to speak. John is now in a rehab center where he continues to improve, sometimes trying to walk, responding to all directions, and is trying to learn once again how to talk. He has his good days and his bad hours but nevertheless all the physicians working with John say it recovery is without doubt a miracle. Medicine did not have any cause in his recovery. Miracles do happen. And if they happen, then it is not at all a surprise that Jesus appears to individuals like Sister Faustina. Her words should carry significance for all of us and help us bring ourselves to Jesus seeking his forgiveness and his new life.
Back to the issue of credibility, of faith in appearances and of miracles accepted by the Church. In December I received a call to come to the Specialty Hospital at 7th and Independence Avenue to anoint a young man. When I arrived, the man's father told me he had had open heart surgery in October. During the operation the man's aorta ruptured. There was no on-the-shelf-aorta waiting for such a rare event. The world-renowned surgeon made an aorta for the man there but it required about 12 minutes ... 12 minutes without the man's brain receiving life-sustaining oxygen. The man was in a coma from that moment on. Several days after my visit with the father and my anointing the man, I returned with a very special mission I felt called to complete because of the extraordinary gift that had been given to me during my days of working with Pope John Paul II. He had entrusted to me one of his zuchettas ... the small skull cap worn by bishops, cardinals and popes. It is a gift that I have guarded and rarely let out of my room. I instructed John's Dad to put the zuchetta on John's head each day and say a prayer to Pope John Paul, requesting his intercession for John. That was in December when the doctors attending John presented his father with a statement that John was now in a permanent, vegetative state. I told John's Dad, "Do not give up." Take this zuchetta to John each day and pray. Now here is the rest of the story. Just three or four weeks ago John's doctors discharged him from the hospital not because there was still no hope but because they now had a patient who came out of a permanent vegetative state and was actually trying to speak. John is now in a rehab center where he continues to improve, sometimes trying to walk, responding to all directions, and is trying to learn once again how to talk. He has his good days and his bad hours but nevertheless all the physicians working with John say it recovery is without doubt a miracle. Medicine did not have any cause in his recovery. Miracles do happen. And if they happen, then it is not at all a surprise that Jesus appears to individuals like Sister Faustina. Her words should carry significance for all of us and help us bring ourselves to Jesus seeking his forgiveness and his new life.
