Jesus to Sr. Josefa Menendez on His Heart of Compassion and Mercy for Sinners

“Now, I want something more, for if I long for love in response to My own, this is not the only return I desire from souls: I want them all to have confidence in My mercy, to expect all from My clemency, and never to doubt My readiness to forgive. I am God, but a God of love! I am a Father, but a Father full of compassion and never harsh. My Heart is infinitely holy but also infinitely wise, and knowing human frailty and infirmity, stoops to poor sinners with infinite mercy. I love those who after a first fall come to Me for pardon . . . I love them still more when they beg pardon for their second sin, and should this happen again, I do not say a million times but a million million times, I still love them and pardon them, and I will wash in My Blood their last as fully as their first sin. Never shall I weary of repentant sinners, nor cease from hoping for their return, and the greater their distress, the greater My welcome. Does not a father love a sick child with special affection? Are not his care and solicitude greater? So is the tenderness and compassion of My Heart more abundant for sinners than for the just. This is what I wish all to know. I will teach sinners that the mercy of My Heart is inexhaustible. Let the callous and indifferent know that My Heart is a fire which will enkindle them, because I love them. To devout and saintly souls


I would be “The Way,” that making great strides in perfection, they may safely reach the harbor of eternal beatitude. Lastly, of consecrated souls, priests and religious, My elect and chosen ones, I ask, once more, all their love and that they should not doubt Mine, but above all that they should trust Me and never doubt My mercy. It is so easy to trust completely in My Heart.” (June 11, 1923).

Holy Saturday - Divine Mercy Novena - Day 2

Second Day

Jesus said to St. Faustina:  "Today bring to Me the Souls of Priests and Religious,and immerse them in My unfathomable mercy. It was they who gave me strength to endure My bitter Passion. Through them as through channels My mercy flows out upon mankind."

Most Merciful Jesus, from whom comes all that is good, increase Your grace in men and women consecrated to Your service,* that they may perform worthy works of mercy; and that all who see them may glorify the Father of Mercy who is in heaven.

Eternal Father, turn Your merciful gaze upon the company of chosen ones in Your vineyard -- upon the souls of priests and religious; and endow them with the strength of Your blessing. For the love of the Heart of Your Son in which they are enfolded, impart to them Your power and light, that they may be able to guide others in the way of salvation and with one voice sing praise to Your boundless mercy for ages without end. Amen.

Apostolic Exhortation on the Sacrament of Penance - Part 26 (part II) - Pope John Paul II

The pastors of the church are also expected to provide catechesis on penance. Here too the richness of the biblical message must be its source. With regard to penance this message emphasizes particularly its value for conversion, which is the term that attempts to translate the word in the Greek text, metanoia,(138) which literally means to allow the spirit to be overturned in order to make it turn toward God. These are also the two fundamental elements which emerge from the parable of the son who was lost and found: his "coming to himself"(139) and his decision to return to his father. There can be no reconciliation unless these attitudes of conversion come first, and catechesis should explain them with concepts and terms adapted to people's various ages and their differing cultural, moral and social backgrounds.

This is a first value of penance and it extends into a second: Penance also means repentance. The two meanings of metanoia appear in the significant instruction given by Jesus: "If your brother repents (returns to you), forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times and says, 'I repent,' you must forgive him."(140) A good catechesis will show how repentance, just like conversion, is far from being a superficial feeling but a real overturning of the soul.

A third value is contained in penance, and this is the movement whereby the preceding attitudes of conversion and repentance are manifested externally: This is doing penance. This meaning is clearly perceptible in the term metanoia, as used by John the Baptist in the texts of the synoptics.(141) To do penance means above all to restablish the balance and harmony broken by sin, to change direction even at the cost of sacrifice.

Diary of St. Faustina....on Chosen souls....

1702  Towards the end of the Way of the Cross which I was making, the Lord Jesus began to complain about the souls of religious and priests, about the lack of love in chosen souls. I will allow convents and churches to be destroyed. I answered, "Jesus, but there are so many souls praising You in convents." The Lord answered, That praise wounds My Heart, because love has been banished from convents. Souls without love and without devotion, souls full of egoism and self-love, souls full of pride and arrogance, souls full of deceit and hypocrisy, lukewarm souls who have just enough warmth to keep them alive: My Heart cannot bear this. All the graces that I pour out upon them flow off them as off the face of a rock. I cannot stand them, because they are neither good or bad. I called convents into being to sanctify the world through them. It is from them that a powerful flame of love and sacrifice should burst forth. And if they do not repent and become enkindled by their first love, I will deliver them over to the fate of this world...

How can they sit on the promised throne of judgment to judge the world, when their guilt is greater than the guilt of the world? There is neither penance nor atonement. O heart, which received Me in the morning and at noon are all ablaze with hatred against Me, hatred of all sorts! O heart specially chosen by Me, were you chosen for this, to give Me more pain? The great sins of the world are superficial wounds on My Heart, but the sins of a chosen soul pierce My Heart through and through...

1703 When I tried to intercede for them, I could find nothing with which to excuse them and, being at the time unable to think of anything in their defense, my heart was seized with pain, and I wept bitterly. Then the Lord looked at me kindly and comforted me with these words: Do not cry. There are still a great number of souls who love Me very much, but My Heart desires to be loved by all and, because My love is great, that is why I warn and chastise them.

Reflection:   Let us pray for our Priests and religious and for renewed fervour in the Church and a greater love for Jesus. 

Diary of St. Faustina....on Gods unfathomable Mercy that we will never understand

Jesus to St. Faustina...

"My daughter, speak to priests about this inconceivable mercy of Mine. The flames of mercy are burning Me-clamoring to be spent; I want to keep pouring them out upon souls; souls just don't want to believe in My goodness." (Diary, 177)

"My love and mercy knows no bounds." (Diary, 718)


"Tell aching mankind to snuggle close to My merciful Heart, and I will fill it -with peace.

Reflection:  Sometimes we just cannot believe Gods mercy for us, can He truly forgive us for what we have done, the answer is Yes.  We will never understand Gods mercy.  Look around you - the world is still moving and exisiting even with all its sins....that in itself is Gods Mercy when we wake up to another day.  So as God is merciful to us, we ask the Lord to help us to be merciful to others.  The world will never understand Gods mercy, we can see this every day in the newspapers and how people are so easily exposed and condemned.  But this is not Gods way.  We are called as Christians to take on the mind of Christ and let His Words guide our thoughts, His actions guide our actions.  We must leave all judgement to God who never turns away from a contrite soul. 

Divine Mercy For Our Priests

During his visit this year to Fatima, Portugal, Pope Benedict XVI expressed in a special prayer the desire for Priests to be 'Apostles of Divine Mercy' guided by Mary.   The Holy Father entrusted and consecrated priests to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on May 12 at the Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Fatima. There, he invoked the Blessed Virgin Mary as "Mother of Mercy" and prayed:

Guided by you, we want to be Apostles of Divine Mercy, glad to celebrate every day the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar and to offer to those who request it the sacrament of Reconciliation.

Also when Pope Benedict XVI opened the Year for Priests in his homily in St. Peter's on June 19, 2009, the solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. It also marked the 150th anniversary of the death of St. John Mary Vianney, the patron of priests. On that occasion, the Holy Father expressed how much priests themselves need to respond to "the call to conversion" and have "recourse to Divine Mercy," so they can avoid "the terrible risk of harming those whom [they] are bound to save":

Even our shortcomings, our limitations, and our weaknesses must lead us back to the Heart of Jesus. Indeed, if it is true that sinners, in contemplating Him, must learn from Him the necessary "sorrow for sins" that leads them back to the Father, it is even more so for holy ministers. How can we forget, in this regard, that nothing makes the Church, the Body of Christ, suffer more than the sins of her pastors, especially the sins of those who are transformed into "a thief and a robber" of the sheep (Jn 10:1 ff.), or who deviate from the Church through their own private doctrines, or who ensnare the Church in sin and death? Dear priests, the call to conversion and recourse to Divine Mercy also applies to us, and we must humbly address a heartfelt and ceaseless invocation to the Heart of Jesus to keep us from the terrible risk of harming those whom we are bound to save.