Defending the Divine Mercy devotion

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victrolatim

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I have a friend who is a very nice man, who, for the most part, follows Rome. Unfortunately, sometimes he gets sucked in by these viral posts/emails from things like Fr. Gruner’s group, the Remnant etc. I have to come at him with an intellectual discussion to sort of keep him from going off the cliff. Recently he shared something about the Divine Mercy devotion being condemned by Pope Pius XII and how it is supposedly “invalid”. There are two things I can think of but I’d like some more information to make an informed discussion. I can think of:

A) Isn’t any devotion/supposed apparition suspect by the universal church until it can be proven?

B) The devotion to Divine Mercy is not dogmatic (I.E. if he doesn’t want to pray it he doesn’t have to)

I tried Googling this and I came up with some weird sedevacantist sites that made me uncomfortable.

This is the link he shared (Please note I do not know the origin of the site)

traditioninaction.org/HotTopics/f072_DivMercy.htm
 
Personally, I love all that the Catholic Church teaches.
However I have come to realize that I am a scrupulous person, because my conscience was not properly formed.

Hence my struggle to commit to a devoution.

==

Is “being” better than “doing”? Like Martha.
 
Actually Satan tried several times to destroy the Divine Mercy message, the first time he convinced St Faustina that he was Jesus and following his direction she destroyed her journal after which Jesus actually did appear to her and reprimanded her and told her to restart the journal.

The second time he (Satan) produced a false/misinterpreted version of the message which was condemned by the Church (the Pope Pius thing you are talking about) and it was not until St John Paul II got into the Papacy and took a new look at everything that the Church approved and now pushes the Divine Mercy message.

However the biggest thing is that the Divine Mercy message itself is not new, it has been around since the early Church, we have always had a feast of Divine Mercy, the image is a new development with St Faustina, the novena is new, I believe the chaplet is a recent development of St Faustina as well, and the Holy Hour, I believe, has been around for a long time as well.

Think about what the message is truly saying, is simply that God’s Divine Mercy is greater than the greatest sinner/sins. It is a call to trust in God’s Mercy. If your friend does not want to venerate the image, pray the novena or chaplet that’s fine, he doesn’t have to. Yet I would have a very hard time understanding why he might have a problem with the message, the feast or the Holy Hour.
 
Divine Mercy Chaplet

O Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fountain of Mercy for us, I trust in You!
O Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fountain of Mercy for us, I trust in You!
O Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fountain of Mercy for us, I trust in You!

Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, Amen.

Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, Amen.

I believe in God, the Father almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried; He descended into hell; on the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty; from there He will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen.

Eternal Father, I offer you the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your Dearly Beloved Son, Our Lord, Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world.

For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.

Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
 
victrolatim said:
I have a friend who is a very nice man, who, for the most part, follows Rome. Unfortunately, sometimes he gets sucked in by these viral posts/emails from things like Fr. Gruner’s group, the Remnant etc. I have to come at him with an intellectual discussion to sort of keep him from going off the cliff. Recently he shared something about the Divine Mercy devotion being condemned by Pope Pius XII and how it is supposedly “invalid”. There are two things I can think of but I’d like some more information to make an informed discussion. I can think of:

A) Isn’t any devotion/supposed apparition suspect by the universal church until it can be proven?
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Hi. You have more than one question here.

Apparitions are a subject in themselves.

Some devotions stem from apparitions but all devotions are ways of expressing love of our Catholic faith, and this has been the case throughout Salvation History.

Apparitions and devotions are not thought of as “suspect” necessarily but they are investigated.
B) The devotion to Divine Mercy is not dogmatic (I.E. if he doesn’t want to pray it he doesn’t have to)
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The Divine Mercy devotion relates to Scripture in its content; by that I mean, that as a whole it doesn’t add to, but emphasizes Scripture, or one aspect of it. The Church has many Dogmas, many articles of faith, so while the Divine Mercy devotion is not a dogma, in itself, as a singular devotion, the devotion does consist of the ‘Patrimony of the Catholic Faith’, which we understand and believe, which is that Christ suffered and died for everyone, even the most hardened sinners, that all can approach His Mercy.
 
I have a devotion to the Divine Mercy.

In my experience, people who are against it are concerned that it overshadows devotion to the Sacred Heart, which stresses reparation for sins.

Also, the devotion emphasizes the idea that “Mercy is God’s greatest attribute,” which can be interpreted as theologically unsound.

These are not my own opinions, but I have heard them before.
 
USMC_Convert said:
Actually Satan tried several times to destroy the Divine Mercy message, the first time he convinced St Faustina that he was Jesus and following his direction she destroyed her journal after which Jesus actually did appear to her and reprimanded her and told her to restart the journal.

The second time he (Satan) produced a false/misinterpreted version of the message which was condemned by the Church (the Pope Pius thing you are talking about) and it was not until St John Paul II got into the Papacy and took a new look at everything that the Church approved and now pushes the Divine Mercy message.

However the biggest thing is that the Divine Mercy message itself is not new, it has been around since the early Church, we have always had a feast of Divine Mercy, the image is a new development with St Faustina, the novena is new, I believe the chaplet is a recent development of St Faustina as well, and the Holy Hour, I believe, has been around for a long time as well.

Think about what the message is truly saying, is simply that God’s Divine Mercy is greater than the greatest sinner/sins. It is a call to trust in God’s Mercy. If your friend does not want to venerate the image, pray the novena or chaplet that’s fine, he doesn’t have to. Yet I would have a very hard time understanding why he might have a problem with the message, the feast or the Holy Hour.
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‘Feast of the Divine Mercy’ or ‘Divine Mercy Sunday’ came about because Jesus said to St. Faustina that it was His wish for this Feast to be established on the first Sunday after Easter.

🙂
 
Are there any good books (the Diary, of course) on St. Faustina and/or the history of the devotion itself?
 
TraditioninAction is a well-known heretical website that continuously denounces anything Catholic and paints the Church in a most deplorable light.

That says it all. It used to be banned from Catholic Answers Forums.
 
I pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy every day I don’t know why some radical traditionalists have such a problem with it but I’ve been around a lot of Polish priests I mean here in the CSRA I think there are at least three. They certainly promote it.
 
There are Apostolates for the Divine Mercy. They sell books, the Diary, art work and DVDS on St Faustia and the Devotion.

Your friend is right in that the devotion was disallowed for a while. But it was then firmly instated , and included the Sunday after Easter Feast of Divine Mercy. By a Pope. A sainted Pope.

So whomever told you it was disallowed was correct. But they don’t have the full story.
  1. This Apparition series has been approved by the Vatican. We are free to devote to it if we wish. And in fact the Pope has granted a Plenary Indulgence with the Feast.
  2. Being a private devotion, it’s like the Rosary. We can be pray it or not. .
As someone else said, satan hates this devotion. We pray for the dying, the dead. Conversion of sinners and hardened hearts. We go to confession, Mass.
We pray globally at 3 pm and/or 3am each day.

Here is a link to Divine Mercy Publications and Website in Aus.
If you have trouble getting materials pm me. In Australia , the printing of a lot of the materials is done by a company near me.

www.Divinemercy.com.au
Sales@divinemercy.com.au

Also www.art-of-divinemercy.co.uk

Tommy Canning’s art is lovely and all about Divine Mercy.

I am sure the guys will be happy to send to USA. If not I will. Bear in mind the DVD formats might be different though.

There may be an American publication outlet?
 
Sirach2 said:
TraditioninAction is a well-known heretical website that continuously denounces anything Catholic and paints the Church in a most deplorable light.

That says it all. It used to be banned from Catholic Answers Forums.
Click to expand...
Yet pretending to be Catholic I suppose.

Quite recently I accidentally came across another deceptive website claiming to be Catholic, when they clearly werent.
We need to be cautious when surfing the Internet, and to recognise the agenda.
 
Forgot to say, The devotion was disallowed due to problems in translating the Diary of St Faustina. She had 3 years schooling all up, and did not punctuate or spell correctly. So her Diary was problematic to read and translate. St Faustina spelt phonetically too.

For USA materials try

Congregation of Marians of the Immaculate Conception
Eden Hill. Stockbridge, MA 01263 USA
 
Given the nature of the website, it wouldn’t surprise me if they recognize the actions of Pope Pius XII but do not recognize the works of Pope St John Paul II that ended up lifting the previous ban (it was after that evil Second Vatican Council after all 😉 ) . Thanks for the resources. I’ve been wanting to learn more about St. Faustina in general myself.

I can’t imagine what a pain that must have been to translate from phonetic Polish. Having Polish ancestry myself…yikes
 
The fellow making the accusation bears the burden of proof. Of course, he is stating only non-authoritative opinion, and poorly-founded opinion at that. Rather, he needs to defend his disobedient, perhaps even schismatic position.
 
po18guy said:
The fellow making the accusation bears the burden of proof. Of course, he is stating only non-authoritative opinion, and poorly-founded opinion at that. Rather, he needs to defend his disobedient, perhaps even schismatic position.
Click to expand...
👍
 
friardchips said:
‘Feast of the Divine Mercy’ or ‘Divine Mercy Sunday’ came about because Jesus said to St. Faustina that it was His wish for this Feast to be established on the first Sunday after Easter.

🙂
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Actually when you read the journal she asks Jesus why He wants a feast to be established because we already have one, Jesus answers but no one knows about it, then He goes on to instruct her that it must be on the second Sunday of Easter and so on (not actual quotes).
 
The Lepanto Institute did a rebuttal of the article in question. It’s at In Defense of the Divine Mercy Devotion

Excerpt:

“There are several errors and misstatements in Msgr. Perez’s article on the Divine Mercy devotion. Msgr. Perez focuses on what he called “condemnations” of the Divine Mercy devotion, and gives no attention to the rescinding of these “condemnations.” For the sake of clarity, it must be stated here that neither St. Faustina’s diary nor the devotion to the Divine Mercy were ever “condemned”. However, Msgr. Perez asserts that…”
 
USMC_Convert said:
Actually when you read the journal she asks Jesus why He wants a feast to be established because we already have one, Jesus answers but no one knows about it, then He goes on to instruct her that it must be on the second Sunday of Easter and so on (not actual quotes).
Click to expand...
Hi. Thanks for getting back. You wouldn’t happen to know off-hand where it says that. I’ve been reading the Diary for ages but the chance of actually going back and finding one little part is remote. All I could find, in reference to what you said, online, was this:

ewtn.com/devotionals/mercy/feast.htm

*'The Feast Of Mercy

During the course of Jesus’ revelations to Saint Faustina on the Divine Mercy He asked on numerous occasions that a feast day be dedicated to the Divine Mercy and that this feast be celebrated on the Sunday after Easter. The liturgical texts of that day, the 2nd Sunday of Easter, concern the institution of the Sacrament of Penance, the Tribunal of the Divine Mercy, and are thus already suited to the request of Our Lord*.

And this, which follows on (speaking about how it was then made so in Poland, then the Vatican before being made known universally:

*‘This Feast, which had already been granted to the nation of Poland and been celebrated within Vatican City, was granted to the Universal Church by Pope John Paul II on the occasion of the canonization of Sr. Faustina on 30 April 2000.’ *
 
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