Pope Benedict XVI will be presiding over the beatification rite for John Paul II on 1 May, Divine Mercy Sunday, in the Vatican. Through a communiqué issued by the Congregation for Saints’ Causes, it was known that the Holy Father, in an audience with the congregation’s prefect, Cardinal Angelo Amato, “authorised the dicastery to promulgate the decree of the miracle attributed to the intercession of Venerable Servant of God John Paul II (Karol Wojtyla).”
Speaking during the most recent edition of Vatican Television’s Octava Dies, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office, said that when Pope John Paul II is beatified on 1 May, Divine Mercy Sunday, the Christian faithful will be simultaneously celebrating a day in which he himself desired the Church to turn its gaze toward this “consoling and enthusiastic greatness”. Thus, Father Lombardi said: “His life and his pontificate were characterised by the passion to make known to the world in which he lived – the world of our tragic history in the course of two millennia – the consoling and enthusiastic greatness of God’s mercy. This is what the world needs. That is why we will have the joy of celebrating the solemn beatification on the day in which he himself wanted the whole Church to fix her gaze and prayer on this Divine Mercy.”
This can be tangibly seen when the Polish Pontiff helped finalising the process of Beatification of Sr Faustina Kowalska and the canonisation in the year 2000. His providential intervention made the whole Church realise the need of meditating and seeing the reality of the Divine Mercy at work in the various global contexts of humanity today. His constant appeal to God’s saving mercy reached its climax when, during his 9th and last apostolic voyage to Poland, on 17 August 2002, precisely in Lagiewniki, where Sr Faustina lived and died, Pope John Paul II entrusted the world to the Divine Mercy, to the infinite trust in the Merciful God, to the One who was both his inspiration and strength along his petrine ministry.
“How greatly today’s world needs God’s mercy! In every continent, from the depth of human suffering, a cry for mercy seems to rise up. Where hatred and the thirst for revenge dominate, where war brings suffering and death to the innocent, there the grace of mercy is needed in order to settle human minds and hearts and to bring about peace. Wherever respect for life and human dignity are lacking, there is need of God’s merciful love, in whose light we see the inexpressible value of every human being. Mercy is needed in order to ensure that every injustice in the world will come to an end in the splendour of truth.
Today, therefore, in this Shine, I wish solemnly to entrust the world to the Divine Mercy. I do so with the burning desire that the message of God’s merciful love, proclaimed here through Saint Faustina, may be made known to all the peoples of the earth and fill their hearts with hope. May this message radiate from this place to our beloved homeland and throughout the world. May the binding promise of the Lord Jesus be fulfilled: from here there must go forth “the spark which will prepare the world for his final coming” (cf. Diary, 1732).
This spark needs to be lighted by the grace of God. This fire of mercy needs to be passed on to the world. In the mercy of God the world will find peace and mankind will find happiness! … May you be witnesses to mercy!”
Let us make the prayer of the Servant of God, Pope John Paul II, our own: “Eternal Father, by the Passion and Resurrection of your Son, have mercy on us and upon the whole world!”
■ Fr Mario Attard OFM Cap
San Gwann