On this Second Sunday of Easter, we also celebrate the feast of the Divine Mercy after St. John Paul II’s proclamation for the entire Church on the day of Sister Faustina’s canonization, April 30th, 2000 in Rome. Sister Faustina Kowalska was instrumental in knowing more about the Divine Mercy as written in her diary.

The institution of this feast was inspired by a desire of Jesus, as conveyed through Sister Faustina. Jesus told her: I desire that the first Sunday after Easter be the Feast of Mercy (Diary 299). 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. The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. On that day all the divine floodgates through which graces flow are opened (Diary 699).

And Jesus did not only define the place of the feast in the liturgical calendar of the Church, but also the reason for its institution - the way it should be prepared, celebrated, and He also spoke about the great promises. The greatest of them is the grace of complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. It is connected with Holy Communion received on that day, following a good Confession in the spirit of the devotion to the Divine Mercy, that is, trusting God and loving our neighbor actively.

Because of these, we are celebrating the feast of the Divine Mercy with the utmost devotion. We recited the novena for nine days that began on Good Friday. It consisted in recitation of the Chaplet to the Divine Mercy and the prayer for nine days.

This feast of the Divine Mercy is perfectly tied up in our gospel this Sunday because it gives us an account on what happened the Easter evening of that first day of the week. John narrated that Jesus stood in the midst of the apostles and said, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you. He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit, if you forgive men’s sins, they are forgiven them; if you hold them bound, they are held bound.”

Here we can see that Jesus instituted the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the great sacrament of mercy in order to confer grace for us and restore our relationship with God caused by our sins. This goes with what He had revealed to St. Faustina.

Let us then ask St. John Paul II and St. Faustina Kowalska to intercede for us, that we may seek the mercies of the Lord daily and live as joyful disciples, always spreading the Gospel by word and example.