My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
Today, the liturgy gives us readings that speak directly to the heart of our struggles: the cry for justice in the face of violence, the call to faith and courage, and the challenge of humble service. Providence has willed that these readings fall today, October 5th, on the feast of St. Faustina Kowalska, the humble Polish nun whom Jesus chose to be the Apostle of Divine Mercy.
This year is particularly rich in anniversaries:
- We mark the 120th anniversary of St. Faustina’s birth in 1905.
- It is the 90th anniversary of the first public veneration of the Divine Mercy Image in Vilnius in 1935, under her guidance.
- And it is 25 years since the Great Jubilee of 2000, when St. John Paul II canonized Faustina as the first saint of the new millennium, declaring that her message of mercy is “most needed in our times.”
So on this day, we cannot help but hear the Word of God through the lens of mercy, and mercy through the gift of faith.
Our first reading, from the prophet Habakkuk, begins with a lament that could have been written yesterday: “How long, O LORD? I cry for help but you do not listen! I cry out to you, “Violence!” but you do not intervene. Why do you let me see ruin; why must I look at misery? This is the cry of every heart that suffers: the cry of those who see war and injustice, the cry of the poor and the oppressed, the cry even of our own restless souls when God seems silent. And what does the Lord answer? “the vision still has its time… if it delays, wait for it, it will surely come… the just one, because of his faith, shall live.” This is the divine answer: faith. Trust. Waiting upon the Lord. And here, already, we hear the resonance of Divine Mercy. In her Diary, St. Faustina recorded the words of Jesus: “Mankind will not have peace until it turns with trust to My mercy.” (Diary, 300). Habakkuk’s question and Faustina’s answer meet here today: in times of trial, the response is faith that trusts in God’s mercy.
In the second reading, St. Paul, writing to Timothy, strengthens this message: “Stir into flame the gift of God… For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but of power and love and self-control.” Faith is not passive; it must be stirred up, rekindled, like embers into fire. Timothy, a young bishop, needed courage to guard the treasure of faith in a hostile culture. So do we. We live in times that challenge faith. To proclaim the Gospel today often requires courage—sometimes even the courage to be countercultural.
St. Faustina, a simple nun with little education, had to face scepticism, doubt, even opposition. Yet through the Spirit, she became a prophet for the whole world. The gift entrusted to her—the message of Divine Mercy—was not to be hidden but proclaimed with boldness.
We too are entrusted with this treasure. We too must guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit, not with fear, but with love and courage. In the Gospel, the apostles ask Jesus a prayer that is still ours today: “Lord, increase our faith.” And Jesus responds: “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” Faith does not need to be spectacular in size. It needs to be alive, authentic, genuine. A mustard seed of faith, placed in the hands of God, can change the world.
This is the story of St. Faustina. Hidden in a convent, unknown to the world, she allowed her little seed of faith to be nourished by Christ. And from that small seed has grown one of the greatest movements of spirituality in our age—the devotion to Divine Mercy, spread across every continent, touching millions of lives.
But Jesus adds another word today: humility. “When you have done all you were commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’” Faustina lived this. She wanted to be hidden, to disappear, to let Jesus’ mercy be everything. And yet precisely in that humility, her witness became universal.
This year’s anniversaries remind us that Divine Mercy is not just a devotion, it is a prophecy for our time and a call to receive God’s Mercy and to become conduits of His Mercy to the world.
And now, as we continue to celebrate the Jubilee Year of Hope and prepare for the World Apostolic Congress on Mercy in Vilnius in 2026, we see how the Lord continues to guide the Church through the path of mercy. Mercy is not weakness. Mercy is the strongest expression of God’s love. It is the only force powerful enough to heal the wounds of our world.
So how do we live this message?
- In our families: by forgiving quickly, by being patient, by teaching children the power of mercy.
- In our parishes and communities: by welcoming the stranger, reaching out to the poor, comforting the suffering.
- In the world: by being witnesses of hope, especially where despair reigns.
Pope Benedict once said: “Faith is not an idea, but a life.” A life transformed by an encounter with Christ – the living God. When we encounter Christ in His mercy, we cannot remain the same.
Dear brothers and sisters, today’s readings and today’s feast bring us to the heart of the Gospel: faith that trusts, faith that serves, faith that proclaims mercy. Habakkuk’s cry becomes our prayer. Paul’s exhortation becomes our mission. The apostles’ request becomes our plea: “Lord, increase our faith.”
And the answer is already given in the simple, powerful prayer that St. Faustina left us—words that carry us from despair to hope, from fear to trust, from death to life: Jesus, I trust in You.
October 5, 2025