Abbey Hosts  Annual Divine Mercy Observance

The Abbey will once again host the Divine Mercy Novena. The Novena will be said on Good Friday at 2:30pm, on Holy Saturday at 12:30pm and on Easter Day at 11am as well as during the week of April 9th (Monday through Saturday) at 8am following regular 7:30am Mass.

       The Sunday after Easter is Divine Mercy Sunday. Mass will be said at 9am and 3pm with Reconciliation available from 1 until 2:45pm. A video will be shown at 1pm and the International Rosary is scheduled for 2pm. The Divine Mercy Chaplet will be said at 2:45pm.

Andrea Rieder, an Oblate of  St. Benedict, has been co ordinator of  the event since he began here at the Abbey in 1994.

     Pope John Paul II officially declared Divine Mercy Sunday in a homily of the Mass for Sister Faustina Kowalska’s canonization on April 30, 2000. The Congregation for divine worship and Discipline of the Sacraments issued the official decree on May 5, 2000.

     It was first introduced in the Archdiocese of Krakow, Poland in 1985. Other Dioceses across Poland began to do the same and on January 23, 1995 Pope John Paul II observed that “genuine devotion to God’s mercy” resulted in the renewal of sacramental life and in widespread generous works of charity.

     The Lord Jesus himself made known His desire for the Feast of Divine Mercy to St. Faustina, a nun from the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, in Plock, Poland in 1931.