MERCY SUNDAY - GRACES BEYOND ANY MERE DEVOTION
There are the extraordinary PROMISES (per the revelation to St. Faustina) that Jesus directly grants for Mercy Sunday.
In Addition to these heavenly promises,
the Catholic Church has granted that a *Plenary Indulgence can ALSO be obtained on Mercy Sunday.
The Promises of extraordinary graces made by Jesus go beyond the conditional graces of a plenary Indulgence. The Church gave a plenary indulgence in addition to what St. Faustina said that Jesus would grant for Mercy Sunday. This is the Church’s highest mark of approval and endorsement of the practice of this message and devotion. The Church has all authority of indulgences on earth and this is the highest indulgence that the earthly Church can grant. When the Church granted this highest indulgence, it added credibility to THE PROMISES, which the Church cannot, in itself, grant as a private revelation. The PROMISES come directly from Jesus.
Theological Analysis of the Extraordinary Graces Promised for Mercy Sunday
The most in-depth analysis ever written of the graces of Divine Mercy Sunday was
provided for the Vatican in the 1970's by Rev. Ignacy Rozycki, STD, a leading expert in Poland
on the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, who also served as a member of the International
Theological Commission for the Holy See.
III. The Extraordinary Graces of Divine Mercy Sunday
According to St. Faustina’s Diary, Jesus Christ made a special promise, which she was to communicate to the whole world (Diary, 699):
My daughter, tell the whole world about My inconceivable mercy. I desire that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of My mercy.
In three places in her diary, St. Faustina records a promise from our Lord of specific, extraordinary graces He will make available through the devout reception of Holy Communion on this Feast Day; truly a “whole ocean of graces” is contained in these promises:
I want to grant a complete pardon to the souls that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion on the Feast of My mercy (1109). Whoever approaches the Fount of Life on this day will be granted complete forgiveness of sins and punishment (300).
The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion will obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment (699).
1. The Promise and the Liturgical Tradition
Why would our Lord promise to pour out such extraordinary graces on this particular Feast Day? On the one hand, we should note the liturgical appropriateness of this promise. If the 17 Octave Day of Easter is truly meant to be, as Pope John Paul II once said, a day of “thanksgiving for the goodness God has shown to man in the whole Easter mystery” (see Chapter I above), then we should not be surprised that He promised the most extraordinary spiritual benefits to those who come to Holy Communion on that day in a state of grace, and with the disposition of trust in His merciful love. After all, what better day could there be in the liturgical calendar for such a generous outpouring of divine grace than the day that recapitulates and completes the greatest annual celebration of the Paschal mystery? As Jesus said to St. Faustina, on this special day of the Church’s liturgical year “the very depths of my tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon these souls who approach the fount of My Mercy” (Diary, 699). This would also be the reason why Christ asked the Church, through St. Faustina, publicly to venerate the Image of The Divine Mercy on this Feast Day. The Image of Jesus, The Divine Mercy, is to have a special place of honor on the Feast of Mercy because it is a visual reminder of all that Jesus did for us through His Passion, Death, and Resurrection, and a reminder, too, of what He asks of us in return – to trust in Him and be merciful to others:
I want the Image to be solemnly blessed on the first Sunday after Easter, and
I want it to be venerated publicly so that every soul may know about it
(Diary, 341).
In short, just as the Feast Day itself is a summary-celebration of the Paschal mystery, so the Image is the visual, iconic summary of the Paschal message. Pope John Paul II pointed this out in his homily for the canonization of St. Faustina:
From that Heart [of Christ], Sr. Faustina Kowalska, the blessed whom from now on we will call a saint, will see two rays of light shining from that heart and illuminating the world. “The two rays”, Jesus Himself explained to her one day, “represent blood and water” (Diary, entry 299).
Blood and water! We immediately think of the testimony given by the Evangelist John, who, when a soldier on Calvary pierced Christ’s side with his spear, sees blood and water flowing from it (see Jn 19:34). Moreover, if the blood recalls the sacrifice of the Cross and the gift of the Eucharist, the water, in Johannine 18 symbolism, represents not only Baptism but also the gift of the Holy Spirit (see Jn 3:5; 4:14; 7:37-39).
Clearly, the promise from our Lord of extraordinary graces for Divine Mercy Sunday, as well as this request to venerate the Image of Mercy on that day spring from the same source: His desire to make that day the summarizing celebration, proclamation, and application of the graces of His merciful love that flow to us from the Paschal mystery.
2. The Promise Draws us to the Sacraments
Rev. Seraphim Michalenko, MIC, explains to us clearly in his booklet The Divine Mercy:
Message and Devotion another, pastoral intention that the Lord seems to have had in promising extraordinary graces on this Feast day:
Our Lord is also emphasizing, through this promise, the infinite value of Confession and Communion as miracles of mercy. He wants us to realize that since the Eucharist is His own Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, it is the “Fountain of Life” (Diary, 300). The Eucharist is Jesus, Himself, the Living God, longing to pour Himself as Mercy into our hearts.
Why would Our Lord feel the need to emphasize this? Because so many people do not really understand it. They either see no need to receive Holy Communion, or they receive it simply out of habit. As St. Paul explains in his letter to the Corinthians, they eat the bread or drink the cup of the Lord unworthily, “without recognizing the body of the Lord” (1 Cor 11:27-29). In His revelations to St. Faustina Our Lord makes it very clear what He is offering us in Holy Communion and how much it hurts Him when we treat His presence with indifference:
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
(1385; also see 1288 and 1447).
So, Our Lord’s promise of complete forgiveness is both a reminder and a call. It is a reminder that He is truly present and truly alive in the Eucharist, filled with love for us and waiting for us to turn to Him with trust. And it is a call for us all to be washed clean in His Love through Confession and Holy Communion – no matter how terrible our sins – and begin our lives again. He is offering us a new start.
3. Theological Analysis of the Extraordinary Graces
Promised for Mercy Sunday
The most in-depth analysis ever written of the graces of Divine Mercy Sunday was provided for the Vatican in the 1970’s by Rev. Ignacy Rozycki, STD, a leading expert in Poland on the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, who also served as a member of the International Theological Commission for the Holy See. Fr. Rozycki devoted nearly ten years of his life to the task of making a thorough and systematic study of Sr. Faustina’s writings. The results of his research were written in French: a massive tome of 500 pages which was presented to the Vatican as part of the official investigation into Sr. Faustina’s life and virtues by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. We have provided below a translation of the entire section of Fr. Rozycki’s work relating directly to the extraordinary graces of Divine Mercy Sunday (pp. 428-432):
In this matter four points are beyond all doubt: (a) The “special grace” was promised in the context of the Feast of Mercy. (b) It was directly attached to receiving Holy Communion on this day. © It consists in the total remission of sins and punishment. (d) It is theologically possible.
In the first place, Jesus promised the “special grace” because the purpose of the Feast is realized by this grace in an especially clear and striking manner.
Immediately preceding the promulgation of this promise, Jesus declared:
I desire that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners. On that day the very depths of My tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of My mercy ... On that day are open all the divine floodgates through which graces flow.
His intention seems clear from the words cited above: in order that the Feast truly be a refuge for all souls, the depths of the generosity of Jesus are entirely open on this day to pour out — without any reserve — graces of every kind and every degree, even the most extraordinary. Now, the promise of this extraordinary grace is a promise for all souls that the generosity of Jesus is really without any limit on this day. At the same time, it is for all souls a motivation for them to ask on this day of The Divine Mercy, with great and limitless trust, for all the graces that the Lord wants to lavish on this Sunday.
Secondly, the obtaining of the “special grace” is, according to the 13th revelation, dependent upon the reception of Holy Communion on the first Sunday after Easter: “to approach the Fount of Life” in this context can only mean “to receive Communion.” Of course, the 33rd revelation enumerates two conditions:
Confession and Holy Communion as the proper norm, the stipulation for acquiring the full pardon. But Jesus surely desired that the greatest possible number of the faithful benefit from this grace and consequently, did not require that Communion as well as Confession be made on that same Sunday, since in the case of a large crowd it would be impossible, for example, in parishes with only one priest. It is permitted then to infer that He allows confession to be made several days before the Feast of Mercy; He insists, however, that one receive Holy Communion on the day of the Feast itself. By this requirement, He incorporates the Devotion into the sacramental life of the Church, because the end of the ordinary period for making Easter Communion falls on that Sunday!
Thirdly, the nature of this special grace was defined in the 13th and 33rd revelations in terms which do not leave any ambiguity: the complete remission of sins and punishment, as said before: it is a total remission of all sins — which have not yet been remitted — and of all punishment due for sins. As for the remission of sins, this grace is therefore equal to that of baptism.
Fourthly, the grace of the total remission of sins and punishment is
theologically possible because neither this grace nor the conditions for obtaining
it contradict revealed doctrine. If God wants to bestow this grace by the sacrament
of baptism, why would He not be able to bestow it — if He wants to — by the
Eucharist which is the greatest sacrament? And the requirement of trust, taught by the 13th as well as the 33rd revelation, and absolutely necessary to every act of the Devotion, is only a reminder of the exhortations of Holy Scripture. Even more, the immensity of this [promise of] grace is precisely the most natural way to revive in us the boundless trust that Jesus so much desires that we have on this day of the Feast of Mercy.
For Jesus does not limit His generosity this day only to the one special grace.
On the contrary, He declares in the 33rd revelation that He desires
that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners.
He does not want this Feast to be one of many similar feasts, alongside others.
Rather, to be truly the refuge and shelter for all souls will be its own property
which distinguishes it from all other feasts. Thus, it is in this way that
on that day the very depths of My tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces on souls who approach the Fount of My mercy.
And Jesus piles up expressions which describe the intensity of His desire to lavish graces on this day:
On that day are open all the divine floodgates through which graces flow.
These words end by a call to trust:
Let no soul fear to draw near to me.
This saying consists of a correlation between mercy and trust: for the only reasonable response to the generosity of Mercy is unlimited trust. The declarations of Jesus above: what practical direction do they have? It is necessary to interpret them in the context of the totality of the Devotion. We will notice first that Jesus did not say that the Feast is the only refuge and the only shelter. As we read in the 43rd revelation:
I am giving mankind the last hope of salvation; that is, recourse to My mercy.
There are, therefore, alongside the Feast, other ways of finding refuge in
Mercy; these are the other forms of the Devotion, and above all, unwavering trust,
which is the only means of drawing graces from the Fount of Mercy. [see Diary
entry 1578: The graces of My Mercy are drawn by means of one vessel only,
and that is — trust. The more a souls trusts, the more it will receive.] So, if the
different forms of the Devotion are a recourse to Mercy, the declarations [of Jesus] above are able to have only one meaning: Jesus ardently desires that the Feast of Mercy be for all men without exception — and especially for sinners — the refuge “par excellence,” incomparably more efficacious than all the other forms of the Devotion.
The supreme excellence of this refuge is shown in three ways: first, by the universality of the divine offer. All men — even those who up until now have not practiced the Devotion, even sinners who convert on the day of the Feast — are called to participate in all the graces, in all their extent, that Jesus “prepared” for this feast. Secondly, it is manifest in the fact that all kinds of graces are offered this day to men; spiritual as well as temporal blessings, as much to individuals as to communities and to all humanity which “will not find peace until it turns to the fount of my Mercy.” Third, all degrees of graces are this day within the reach of 23 all, provided that with great trust they ask for great graces. Such an extraordinary abundance of graces are not attached to any other form of the Devotion. And since Mercy rejoices when it is able to give much, the heart of Jesus also delights in this feast. The extraordinary generosity that the Savior wants to show is also the reason why the practice of mercy is not necessarily required on this day itself in order to receive the special grace and the other promises. The Feast of Mercy will become for everyone truly the refuge “par excellence,” if we fulfill three conditions.
1. If we will bear in mind the extraordinary fervor with which Jesus wants to fill us with an abundance of graces on this day.
2. If we have the courage to bring to the Mercy of Jesus all our needs —known and unknown, temporal and spiritual, individual and communal — in all their real extent (which often lies beyond our knowledge).
3. If we will present [our needs] with a trust that is not only unwavering, but also boundless, because it is trust that opens up to us the treasures of Mercy. In 1981, at a symposium in Cracow celebrating the 50th anniversary of the revelations given to Sr. Faustina, Fr. Rozycki delivered a lecture entitled The Essential Features of the Devotion to The Divine Mercy in which he summarized his analysis of the extraordinary graces of Divine Mercy Sunday. As the phrasing of this passage has given rise to misunderstanding on occasion, we will quote the passage below, and then provide clarification:
The most exceptional grace promised by Jesus for the Feast of the Divine Mercy is something considerably greater than a plenary indulgence. The latter consists only of the remission of temporal punishments for committed sins, but is never the remission of sins itself. The exceptional grace of [the Communion on] Divine Mercy Sunday is also greater than the graces of the other sacraments, with the exception of the Sacrament of Baptism, for the remission of all sins and punishment is found only in the sacramental grace of Baptism. In the promises 24 cited, Christ tied the remission of all sins and punishment to the reception of Holy Communion on the Feast of Divine Mercy. In other words, in this regard, He raised it to the rank of a “second Baptism.” It is obvious that in order to effect a complete forgiveness of sins and punishment the Holy Communion received on the Feast of Divine Mercy must not only be partaken of worthily, but it must also fulfill the basic requirements of the Divine Mercy devotion. ... However, received unworthily, without trust in Divine Mercy and devoid of some deed of mercy toward neighbor, it would be a contradiction of Devotion to the Divine Mercy. Instead of the exceptional grace, it would bring down upon the recipient the Divine Wrath. The spiritual good of the faithful demands that they know what graces they can obtain, and under what conditions through the reception of Holy Communion on the Feast of Divine Mercy.
We should note several things about Fr. Rozycki’s summary statement here:
1. By “second Baptism” Fr. Rozycki did not mean a repetition of baptism, or some kind of additional baptism (as though an eighth sacrament) but a renewal of grace in the soul akin to that enjoyed as a result of the reception of the sacrament of Baptism. That this was Fr. Rozycki’s meaning is clear from the longer text (quoted above) which he had prepared for the Vatican.
2. According to Jesus’ promise the extraordinary grace of the complete remission of sins and punishment is received from the worthy reception of Holy Communion on Mercy Sunday. It is not an extra-sacramental grace! This is clear from the longer text (quoted above) and from the shorter summary, (also quoted above) where Fr. Rozycki states this explicitly several times. Thus, when Fr. Rozycki writes in his shorter text that the exceptional grace of Divine Mercy Sunday “is also greater than the graces of the other sacraments, with the exception of the Sacrament of Baptism,” he does not mean to imply that this exceptional grace comes to us other than through the reception of Holy Communion on that day — rather, he is simply telling us that, ordinarily, only the sacrament of Baptism effects in the soul the “complete forgiveness of sins and punishment.” Reception of the Eucharist in a state of grace ordinarily remits only venial sin, while strengthening the soul against both venial and mortal sin (Catechism, 1394-1395). But on Mercy Sunday, according to Fr. Rozycki (based on our Lord’s words, to St. Faustina), reception 25 of Holy Communion pours out upon the soul a complete renewal of baptismal grace. Of course, this immediately raises the question of whether it is proper to the nature of the Eucharist to be the source of such an extraordinary measure of grace. The answer is clear from the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas and of the magisterium itself. St. Thomas declares very clearly:
“Moreover, not only are all the other sacraments ordered toward the Eucharist, but they produce their proper grace only in virtue of their relationship to the Eucharist.
Finally, we should bear in mind that theological analysis of Divine Mercy Sunday, and the extraordinary graces available on that day, has only just begun. In the future, no doubt, new perspectives will arise, both to extend the insights of Fr. Michalenko and Fr. Rozycki, and to supplement their work. For example, there is a theological tradition in the Church which states that a complete renewal of baptismal grace is available to the soul at every sacramental confession, if the soul comes to the Lord with perfect contrition, i.e., perfect love of God. St. Catherine of Siena, for example, writes in The Dialogue (no. 75) of how martyrdom, baptism by desire, and sacramental confession undertaken with a pure heart, all wash the soul as clean as baptism itself. Our Lord said to her:
By shedding both blood and water I showed you the holy baptism of water that you receive through the power of my blood. But I was also showing you the baptism of blood, and this in two ways. The first touches those who are baptized in their own blood poured out for me. Though they could not have the other baptism, their own blood has power because of mine. Others are baptized in fire when they lovingly desire baptism but cannot have it. ...
There is a second way the soul receives this baptism of blood, figuratively speaking. This my divine charity provided because I know how people sin 27 because of their weakness. Not that weakness or anything else can force them to sin if they do not want to, but being weak they do fall into deadly sin and lose the grace they had drawn from the power of the blood in holy baptism. So my divine charity had to leave them an ongoing baptism of blood accessible by heartfelt contrition and a holy confession as soon as they can confess to my ministers who hold the key to the blood. This blood the priest pours over the soul in absolution. But if they cannot confess, heartfelt contrition is enough for the hand of my mercy to give them the fruit of this precious blood. ...
So you see, this baptism is ongoing, and the soul ought to be baptized in it right up to the end, in the way I have told you. In this baptism you experience that though my act of suffering on the cross was finite, the fruit of that suffering which you have received through me is infinite. This is because of the infinite divine nature joined with finite human nature [in Christ].
According to St. Catherine of Siena, therefore, the complete renewal of baptismal grace is available to the soul from the Mercy of God in a variety of ways, and a renewal of these graces should be a constant feature of the life of the soul journeying toward perfection. If so, then what is so “extraordinary” about the grace of baptismal renewal offered to souls on Divine Mercy Sunday? Is not such an extraordinary grace always available to us? First, let us examine the nature of the extraordinary grace itself. One can, theoretically, receive the complete remission of sins and punishment any time from the sacrament of Confession followed by Holy Communion, all undertaken with the perfect love of God. But how many of the faithful ordinarily receive these sacraments with such a pure disposition? Usually, the intentions of the penitent-communicant are more mixed, including fear of God as well as love, and, to some extent, with continuing attachment to their sins. As a result, while their sins are forgiven, there remains the temporal punishment due to sin (see Catechism 1472-1473). Of course, this temporal punishment can be completely taken away through a plenary indulgence, granted by the Church, for the devout performance of certain designated good works (such as the recitation of prayers, giving of alms, visiting of a shrine, etc.) – but, 28 again, if these works are not undertaken with pure love of God, then the indulgence is only partial, not plenary. The complete remission of sins and punishment, ex opere operato, is ordinary only available to the soul at baptism. What Jesus Christ has promised to the world, through St. Faustina, is that this complete renewal of this same baptismal grace – the complete remission of sins and punishment – is also available to the faithful through the reception in a state of grace of Holy Communion on Divine Mercy Sunday. In other words, one could argue that what makes Mercy Sunday so extraordinary is not just the eminence of the graces offered, but also, uniquely, the lesser requirement for receiving them: the reception of Holy Communion by a heart filled only with trust in Divine Mercy. This “trust,” it might be said, is not yet an act of perfect love of God, not yet perfect contrition. For trust in God involves merely a cleaving to God because of His promised benefits. As such, it is, merely, a precondition for the formation, by divine grace, of perfect love in the soul: the pure, selfless love of God for His own sake. Trust is the opening of the soul by faith, hope, humility, and repentance, to receive all the most eminent graces — and especially the gift of perfect charity — from the Heart of the Savior. Fr. Rozycki describes trust in this way:
This same attitude of life is described by St. Paul and by the whole of Christian theology as hope, the divine virtue of hope which springs from a living faith in the infinity of God’s love and goodness towards us. It is indissolubly tied to humility, that is the sincere and deep conviction that all good within us and which we do is the work and gift of God; that we possess nothing except that which we have from God. This trust-hope constitutes the opening of a soul’s receiving Divine grace, and the requesting of it is an attitude of continuous and most effective prayer.
Truly, this very disposition — trust, and nothing more — is what the Lord asks us to bring to Divine Mercy Sunday, in order to receive the whole ocean of His mercy (diary entries 1520, and 1578):
I have opened My Heart as a living fountain of mercy. Let all souls draw life from it. Let them approach this sea of mercy with great trust. ...
The more a soul trusts, the more it will receive.
Still, one might well ask: why are the “floodgates” of Divine Mercy said to be fully open, on this basis, only on one particular Feast Day, rather than at every Holy Communion? This objection seems much like the objection of some of the radical Protestant reformers of the 16th and 17th centuries to the claim that Holy Communion imparts special graces to souls, in a unique and more intimate manner than is normally available to souls from the practice of communal prayer. Why do we limit God’s Mercy in this way? The answer is that we do not intend to limit God’s Mercy – He is always free to pour out His Mercy in any way, at any time – but we do intend to believe His promises. From Holy Scripture we know that the Father promised that a unique and intimate communion with His Son can be obtained through the Holy Eucharist, and from Christ’s prophetic revelations to St. Faustina, we know (that is, we know by “prophetic” rather than “theological faith”) that He has promised an exceptional abundance of graces – a complete renewal of Baptism – to those who receive Holy Communion in a state of grace, with great trust in His Mercy, on Divine Mercy Sunday. This is not because Christ is “stingy,” or withholds such plenary grace at other times, but because His own divine way is to bestow His graces in a manner and time which best enables us to receive them. For example, to creatures made up of soul and body, He willed to impart spiritual graces in a bodily manner: through consecrated, transubstantiated bread and wine. The manner of the gift was thereby suited to the nature and needs of its intended recipients. Similarly, to souls struggling to accept the Love of Christ, and to love Him in return (that is, to all of us) our Lord promised that the most extraordinary graces of His Mercy could be obtained merely through reception of Holy Communion, with trust in The Divine Mercy, at the very time – indeed on the very day – in the liturgical cycle best suited to maximize and predispose souls to trust in Him: the culmination and summary of the celebration of the Paschal Mystery, the very Octave Day of Easter.
