As we complete this long and challenging Lenten journey and enter into the Easter season, the Risen Christ beckons us to focus on God’s loving mercy. We celebrate on the Second Sunday of Easter the feast of Divine Mercy, established by Pope St. John Paul II in 2000 on the day of St. Faustina Kowalska’s canonization. Divine Mercy Sunday is a continuous reminder of Jesus’ words to the Polish nun that the world “will not find peace until it turns trustfully to divine mercy.”
While declaring Faustina a saint, the late Pope noted that in her lifetime spanning the 20th century the planet endured immense suffering, including two world wars. But he also called her the first new saint of the new millennium, anticipating the crises and challenges to come. He asked at the canonization, “What will the years ahead bring us? What will man’s future on earth be like? We are not given to know.”
As the coronavirus pandemic demonstrates dramatically and painfully, we do not know the future. But we do know that God, who is not subject to time, wills our good in all things, hears our prayers and is with us now. And we can turn with confidence at this moment to the Divine Mercy. “Humanity,” Pope John Paul proclaimed, “must let itself be touched and pervaded by the Spirit given to it by the Risen Christ.”
As we embark on the joy-filled and perhaps sharper-focused Easter season, one troubled by the ongoing global pandemic, let us turn anew to Our Lord. Let us say with one voice, “Jesus, I trust in you!”
God bless you!