April 2, 2005
Dear Friends in Christ’s Divine Mercy,
I write this message to you with a heavy heart. I imagine you receive
it with a similar sentiment. As I write this letter our beloved Holy
Father has just taken his last breath. I know you join me in heartfelt
prayers to God of thanksgiving for blessing us with John Paul’s
life and ministry, for graciously providing dying graces to our Holy
Father, and for his entry into his heavenly reward.
As I celebrated Mass this morning with the Daughters of St. Paul,
a word and concept struck my spirit: “fulness.” Jesus
came into the world in the fulness of time (Gal. 4:4). It was God’s
time, not man’s time. Everything that happens in the divine
plan comes to pass in God’s time according to His plan. We
had been gathered in vigil around the Pope as we do for all our loved
ones, i.e. we waited and prayed. Birth and death are times of prayerful
waiting. We are not in control of these events even when they are
imminent. God is the author of life, and events are in His hands.
Yet as we discern God’s plan especially in hindsight we can
often see His hand guiding events to serve His eternal plan and purpose.
Once it became apparent that our Holy Father’s time of death
was close at hand I had been praying that he would be able to stay
alive until Divine Mercy Sunday. In fact, he passed away on the vigil
of the feast, but in no way does that diminish his connection to
the important feast. At the time of his death the Divine Mercy Liturgy
was already being celebrated throughout the world. That is why the
thought of "fulness” came to me so strongly. There is
great significance to the “eighth day” as well as to
the “first day.” For example, Jesus was circumcised on
the eighth day. Also, in Jn 7:37 ff. We read of Jesus on the eighth
day: “On the last and greatest day of the feast Jesus stood
there and cried aloud, If any man is thirsty, let him come to me,
and drink; yes, if a man believes in me, as the Scriptures say, Fountains
of living water shall flow from his bosom…” (See also
Is. 44: 3 and Zach. 13:1). It is on the eighth day that we celebrate
the Feast of Divine Mercy within the Octave of Easter. It is on the
eighth day that living blood and water pour forth from the heart
of Jesus.
Divine Mercy Sunday is, of course, on the eighth day. The Octave
of Easter concludes on Divine Mercy Sunday. Our Novena now complete,
reaches it climax at the Divine Mercy Liturgy itself. It is a “full” time
in the liturgical year. As devotees of Christ’s Divine Mercy
you know that it is a time of extraordinary grace. It is, therefore,
a most fitting time for our beloved Holy Father to pass through the
Merciful Heart of Jesus into Heaven.
Our Holy Father had an extraordinarily “full” papacy.
For twenty-six years he was our ROCK, the Vicar of Christ on earth.
He has been a shepherd after the model of our Lord Himself, laying
down his life over and over gain for his sheep. How much Jesus must
love Him! The early physical vibrancy of our Holy Father gave way
to an increasingly infirm man and much of his suffering can truly
be seen as beginning with his shooting in 1981. Yet he has not only
endured heroically, but in and through Jesus and Mary he was victorious!
The vigourous mountain climber and swimmer became the man on a cane,
a chair, and finally on a bed. But he never for a second stopped
giving every single beat of his heart for his Lord and for us! Being
Holy Father is not merely a matter of performing tasks, but it is
most significantly being an icon of Christ Himself. The man, who
spoke sixteen languages and was known to greet pilgrims on Easter
in sixty languages, spoke most eloquently this Easter when he could
not say a single word. He went to the window and could not speak
a word, but I saw (and I trust you saw) Christ very powerfully in
that moment. Even as late as Wednesday he insisted on blessing the
crowd from his window. He always gave every ounce of his strength
for the Lord, Mother Mary and for us his flock. Each of us should
be truly and eternally grateful. We should strive to be as wholehearted
in our vocations as our Holy Father was to his vocation.
Our Holy Father from the beginning of his life had a special relationship
to Mary. When he was born in Wadowice, Poland his mother asked that
the windows be opened so that Carol could hear the Angelus bells.
His whole life was singularly dedicated to Mary. Perhaps losing his
own mother as a young boy served in part to draw him even closer
to Mary. He has been throughout his life and papacy "totally
hers!” I have thought often in these last few years of the
vision of Don Bosco of a pope at the end of the 20th century safely
guiding the ship of the Church through the twin pillars of Mary and
the Eucharist. What a prophetic vision! Was not that a genuine description
of this Holy Father’s papacy? His papacy was rooted in his
deepest conviction: “to Jesus through Mary.” He takes
his leave from this earth in the Year of the Eucharist.
His papacy has also, of course, been one of Divine Mercy. As I prayed
the last prayers of the Novena this morning I thought of the souls
we have focused on each day of our Novena in light of our Holy Father’s
life and ministry. In your own prayer time go back and reflect on
how our Holy Father has extended himself for souls that were lukewarm,
away from the Church, or priests and religious for example. He was
always reaching out, always evangelizing even in the face of great
physical pain. He had an enormous zeal for souls and nothing would
prevent him (even a disabling illness) from keeping a schedule that
would have made someone half his age collapse. It was his merciful
love for Jesus that impelled him to give his whole self for his brothers
and sisters. As he lived in his last hours he had the serenity of
one who knew that he gave his all to the Lord for the salvation of
souls.
Remember that it was as Cardinal that our Holy Father was instrumental
in lifting the ban on the devotion to Divine Mercy (which St. Faustina
foresaw). Remember that it was John Paul II who beatified Sr. Faustina.
Remember that it was John Paul II on Mercy Sunday 2000 who declared
Divine Mercy Sunday as a universal feast of the Church and who canonized
St. Faustina at the same time. John Paul II has been the Holy Father
of Divine Mercy and his illness and death has been an unprecedented
moment of evangelization on Divine Mercy and the message of St. Faustina.
Even in his death our Holy Father was preaching, teaching, leading,
guiding, and laying down his life for souls.
As we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday this year we cannot help but
be sad, but let it also be a time of thanksgiving and Easter joy.
Our Holy Father had a full life and a full papacy. He had a full
share in the Cross of Christ. Join me in praying that he may also
have a full share of eternal happiness in heaven.
We thank you, Lord, on this Divine Mercy Sunday for the gift of “John
Paul the Great!” May his noble soul, through the Divine Mercy
of Jesus, rest in peace.
Sincerely,
Rev. Richard F. Clancy
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