At many of the previous penance services, I have thought to myself of the crazy ads on TV. They always say, “this deal is so good we are practically giving it away.” I find myself laughing because when I think of God’s mercy, God IS giving it away all the time. What we are celebrating on Divine Mercy Sunday isn’t that it’s a special day that God forgives. Many people believe this unfortunately. Divine Mercy Sunday is a day that reminds us that God’s divine mercy happens to us every day, all the time. However, we are slow to believe in God’s unconditional love for us. We are more than likely to start with the base principle that we have to earn forgiveness. This is our experience of human mercy. Humans are not willing to forgive until we have paid the last penny and even then it still isn’t enough.
Let’s not confuse typical human ‘mercy’ with divine mercy. God is love and sometimes we confuse our limited ideas of what we sometimes call love with that real love that is God. Love is a gift, never earned. It is simply and wondrously given by our God. Try as we might to earn it, God let’s us know, “don’t you know, I already love you.” So why do we choose against it? Hard to say, maybe it’s too good to be true, we prefer our system of earning forgiveness. It is the way the world operates. On the other hand, if we accepted divine mercy it would challenge us to be that merciful and forgiving toward others. As humans that is hard to tolerate. The older I get the more I prefer God’s love and obviously God is way more patient and tolerant than I am.
God bless,
Fr. Chris