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Amid our busy workdays and weekends, it is not unusual for most of us to let the 3 pm hour pass by as any other hour in the day. Yet after reading the Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska, Divine Mercy in My Soul, the 3 pm hour has become a deeply significant time for me. We know 3 pm is significant for us on Good Friday as the hour when Christ breathed his last and died on the cross for our sins and those of the whole world. We also know it is the hour when his side was...

Divine Mercy Diary Exerpts   Jesus's words are in italics.  St. Faustina's words are in regular print.   "Your task is to write down everything that I make known to you about My mercy, for the benefit of those who by reading these things will be comforted in their souls and will have the courage to approach Me." (1693)     "Mankind will not have peace until it turns with trust to My mercy." (300)     

To grasp the full symbolism of the Vatican rites in which 1 million or more Catholics celebrated the beatification of Pope John Paul II, it helps to understand the visions recorded decades earlier in the diary of Sister Mary Faustina Kowalksa. Popes come and popes go. But the lives of this Polish nun and this Polish pope may be helping to reshape a crucial piece of the Catholic year — the celebrations that follow Easter, the high point of the Christian year. It was in 1937 that Kowalksa wrote: "As I was praying for Poland I heard the words: I...

Jesus asked that the Feast of the Divine Mercy be preceded by a Novena to the Divine Mercy which would begin on Good Friday. He gave St. Faustina an intention to pray for on each day of the Novena, saving for the last day the most difficult intention of all, the lukewarm and indifferent of whom He said: "These souls cause Me more suffering than any others; it was from such souls that My soul felt the most revulsion in the Garden of Olives. It was on their account that I said: 'My Father, if it is possible, let this...

A banker on a business trip in New York City, Fred Berretta had just checked into his hotel room. He had about 20 minutes down time before he had to meet his colleagues. For some reason he decided to clean out his briefcase, something he hadn't done in a long time. As he emptied it out, he came across a booklet he had stuffed into a pocket years ago on praying the Chaplet of The Divine Mercy. He recalls having prayed it a few times years ago. But by Jan. 15, 2009, it was a good intention mislaid —...

It was in Poland during the 1930s that Jesus himself lit the fire of Divine Mercy devotions. He revealed his desire for this special ardor to a humble nun, Sister Faustina Kowalska. And he specifically asked that a feast in its honor be celebrated on the first Sunday after Easter. The flames spread bit by bit until the Jubilee Year 2000, when they burst into a conflagration. This came when Pope John Paul II declared — on April 30, at the canonization Mass for St. Faustina Kowalska — that “this Second Sunday of Easter … from now on throughout the...

"You Are Eloquent Witnesses of God's Mercy" KRAKOW, Poland, MAY 28, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI visited the Shrine of Divine Mercy in Lagiewniki on Saturday, after his visit to the Shrine of Our Lady of Kalwaria. At Lagiewniki the Pope prayed at the tomb of St. Faustina Kowalska, where Karol Wojtyla often went as a laborer and later as an underground seminarian. Benedict XVI then went to the basilica, where 800 sick people awaited him. Here is a Vatican translation of his address to them. * * * Dear Brothers and Sisters, I am very pleased to be able to...

Divine Mercy Devotion and NovenaWhat is Divine Mercy? The message and devotion to Jesus as The Divine Mercy is based on the writings of Saint Faustina Kowalska, an uneducated Polish nun who, in obedience to her spiritual director, wrote a diary of about 600 pages recording the revelations she received about God's mercy. Even before her death in 1938, the devotion to The Divine Mercy had begun to spread   Mercy Prayers There are many prayers invoking the Mercy of God. However, the two main prayers of the Divine Mercy Message and Devotion are the Chaplet of The Divine Mercy...

A POPE DESCRIBED AS 'FROM THE SUN' WAS BORN DURING ECLIPSE AND LEAVES WITH ONEHe was born during an eclipse (May 18, 1920) and there will be an eclipse, a rare type of partial eclipse, Friday (April 8) on the day of his burial. And so now eyes have turned more intently to an old prophecy attributed to the Irish monk St. Malachy O'Morgair -- who supposedly foresaw the entire succession of popes by using riddle-like nicknames, with the one fitting the 110th -- John Paul II -- being De Labore Solis, which means  "from the labor of the sun."Indeed,...

October 5, 2004 Tuesday of the Twebty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time Psalm: Tuesday 43 Reading I Responsorial Psalm Gospel Reading IGal 1:13-24 Brothers and sisters: You heard of my former way of life in Judaism, how I persecuted the Church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it, and progressed in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries among my race, since I was even more a zealot for my ancestral traditions. But when he, who from my mother's womb had set me apart and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, so...

SEER FROM CHURCH-APPROVED SITE CLAIMS CHRIST IS PREPARING FOR A MANIFESTATION Maria Esperanza with Mother Teresa of Calcutta in 1982www.spiritdaily.comIn the revised version of a book based on her visions, seer Maria Esperanza Bianchini of Caracas, Venezuela, claims that Jesus is on the verge of a major appearance or manifestation. The assertion is made in The Bridge To Heaven, a collection of interviews originally published in 1993 and set for re-release this week with updated interviews and information. A manifestation or the Final Coming? We are leaving this for your own determination and make this distinction because there have been...

MID RUMORS THAT HE WOULD announce his retirement due to failing health, Pope John Paul II traveled to Poland last summer and proclaimed a message far different to the expectant world. During a dedication Mass in the shrine of Divine Mercy in Krakow Aug. 17, the pope announced: “Today, therefore, in this shrine, I wish solemnly to entrust the world to Divine Mercy.” The Divine Mercy devotion, though humble in origin, offers nothing less than the promise of salvation and peace to all mankind. Efforts on many different fronts are furthering the hope that Catholics everywhere will soon know...

Tens of thousands of people have greeted the Pope on the first full day of what is being seen as his farewell visit to his native Poland. Large crowds clapped and cheered as John Paul II arrived to consecrate the Basilica of Divine Mercy near Krakow, a shrine to Poland's first woman saint. The ultra-modern shrine commemorates a Polish nun canonised by the Pope two years ago. New stamps commemorate the visit Later on Saturday, the pontiff is due to receive President Aleksander Kwasniewski and Prime Minister Leszek Miller at his official residence. The Pope is on his ninth...

ZENIT - The World Seen From Rome Code: ZE02081608Date: 2002-08-16John Paul II Brings Message of Mercy to His HomelandCalls for Help for the UnemployedKRAKOW, Poland, AUG. 16, 2002 (Zenit.org).- John Paul II arrived in his beloved Krakow, bringing a message of mercy and solidarity to a homeland profoundly changed in the post-Communist era. "This is a new pilgrimage in which I can see how Poles handle their reconquered freedom," the Pope said today, reiterating the famous words of his 1979 visit at the height of the Communist regime: "Be not afraid." As he began his ninth trip to Poland,...