I've always felt a little queasy about the Divine Mercy Devotion. Personally, I don't pray it. Instead I pray the Sacred Heart novena which Padre Pio prayed every day. There are thousands of devotions in the Church. No one Catholic could pray them all. God gave us this abundance because we are like a huge flower garden. What nourishes one flower could kill another. The rosary is certainly a devotion for all that is like putting the best fertilizer on every flower in the garden. Most devotions aren't like that.
At any rate, I don't disparage anyone's devotion. God can use anything, even error to bring people closer to Christ. I don't believe Medjugorje was legitimate, but I visited there with a friend who wanted to go and received blessings. I attribute that more to the faith of the people who went there than to the alleged apparitions.
There is also a different outlook on St. Faustina and the Divine Mercy devotion which the priest in the video below defends. Frankly, I think Fr. Burfitt has the better of the argument. I agree that the Divine Mercy devotion tends to promote the idea of universal salvation and that there are things in the diary that, even after translation corrections, are problematic. [Read here and here.] But in the interests of transparency I offer both sides. Let people consider all the information, make up their minds, and follow their own consciences. I will continue to pray the novena to the Sacred Heart rather than the Divine Mercy chaplet.
We can't limit God. He loves our faith and blesses us in all kinds of circumstances. His attention to the woman at the well is a good example, and, of course, the woman taken in adultery. He is quick to offer grace to the neediest among us. Grace builds on nature and even our fallen nature and, yes, our sins can be a source of bringing us to God and inviting us to greater holiness. Remember Mary Magdalene. "Who has been forgiven much loves much."
I invite you to join me in praying the Novena to the Sacred Heart. I'll be offering it for the happy repose of the soul of my husband's brother Albert who died on Holy Saturday. I pray that he is already kneeling in adoration before the throne of God. He suffered so much during these past few years that I think, if he has any time in Purgatory at all, it will be short. I pray to act in suffering with the same courage Albert did. Please offer prayers for him and for his family. He is beyond suffering. His wife and family are walking in the dark valley of grief and loneliness. There's a good chance I will be the one to walk that journey in the future. May God give us all the courage to accept everything that occurs to us according to His Divine Will.
Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, I place all my trust in You.
Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us!
As a SSPX parishioner I agree with Father Nix.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.padreperegrino.org/2019/04/div-mercy/
I am not into the divine Mercy but if people get something out of it then more power to them. Like you its the never ending foregiveness that disturbs me. My friend Victor was a lapsed Catholic who returned to the faith. First thing he did was get a rather hiddious tatoo of the divine Mercy Christ with no heart. When I ask him when was the last time you went to confession. He said years but he didn't have to because according to divine mercy on the final day he will be forgiven. I told him why don't you go to confession just to hedge your bets remember God is also the supreme judge.
ReplyDeleteI pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy daily and am looking forward to celebrating the Feast this Sunday and obtaining all it promises.
ReplyDeleteAbout 35 years ago, a wonderful pastor in Oregon was asked about praying the chaplet. (It had just become popular again.) He said he'd heard of it but didn't know much about it and would have to study it before recommending it. Then he asked the woman, 'Do you pray the rosary daily?' She said she did not, and he suggested to her that she pray the Blessed Mother's rosary daily, and then to add other prayers if she had time.
ReplyDeleteMy point is that many people like that prayer because it is much shorter than a rosary, but they 'feel' as if they've sort-of prayed a rosary since they used their beads.
Your argument brings to mind Jesus’ parable about the first workers complaint that the last workers received as much money as the workers who put in the full day.
ReplyDeleteCan you explain that; I don't see the connection. If Sr. Faustina was a hysteric who imagined these things, then the devotion is problematic to say the least. If there are things in the diary that conflict with Church teaching, it is worse than problematic. Your analogy doesn't make any sense to me.
Delete"In 1959, the HOLY OFFICE (the Vatican’s doctrinal agency, today known as the Congregation for Doctrine of the Faith) issued a cease and desist order against Faustina’s diary and the devotion to Divine Mercy, a BAN that was to last almost 20 years, until 1978. Wojtyla had long been working to reverse the verdict, having launched the beatification process for Faustina in 1965 while he was archbishop of Kraków.
ReplyDeleteOfficially, the 20-year ban is now attributed to misunderstandings created by a faulty Italian translation of the Diary, but in fact there were SERIOUS THEOLOGICAL RESERVATIONS -- Faustina’s claim that JESUS had PROMISED A COMPLETE REMISSION OF SIN FOR certain DEVOTIONAL ACTS THAT ONLY THE SACRAMENTS CAN OFFER, for example
https://natcath.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2002c/083002/083002f.htm
The image which does not include Christ's sacred heart is concerning to me since He asked St. Margaret Mary Alacoque to spread that devotion. To me it is part of the protestant heresy to divorce God's mercy not only from His sacraments, but more importantly from His love. His mercy stems from His love for each one of us. To grow in the love of God/neighbor (greatest commandments)/understand why we follow/seek to imitate Him must contemplate His love.