"One of the speakers said Jesus is more hurt by you not trusting Him than all of your sins together, and I think that stood out to me a lot. I think sometimes we can be very hard on ourselves and not understand the amount of the love and mercy that Jesus has for us, so that has been very eye-opening.”
The Third North American Congress on Mercy (NACOM III) is taking place Nov. 15-17, for the first time in Canada! Under the theme “Divine Mercy and Mary: Our Hope,” the Congress is held at Good Shepherd Church in Surrey, a suburb of Vancouver.
Day 2: Saturday, November 16, 2024
Thank you, Canadian Catholic Women's League and the Knights of Columbus!
Father Chris Alar, MIC, led Morning Prayer and Brother Josh, MIC, recited the Rosary to start Day 2 of NACOM.
Willie and Noemi traveled from Seattle, Washington, for their first Congress. Asked what she would say to someone who’s never attended this sort of event or knows about Divine Mercy, Noemi said, “Today’s world is in chaos. We really need to go to Him. We always pray for sinners to turn back and go to Him but I believe it should really start from us who already knows Him. We really need to put a step forward in order to propagate His words, the Gospel. We want to really serve Him, obey Him, and love Him. There’s no way we could love Him the way He loves us, but we can at least give something in return.”
NACOM attendees Gwen and Alberdo. Alberdo is a Fourth Degree District Marshall of the Knights of Columbus.
Getting ready for Morning Mass.
Pilgrims venerate the relics of St. Faustina and Pope St. John Paul II before Mass.
Father Kazimierz Chwalek, MIC, NACOM Coordinator, is lead celebrant of the opening Mass. He began the Mass by explaining that today, Nov. 16, is the feast of Our Lady, Mother of Mercy, also known as Our Lady of the Dawn Gate. Arising from the devotion of the Lithuanian people to an ancient, miraculous image of Our Lady kept in a chapel over the Eastern gate of Vilnius, this devotion is inextricably tied to the Divine Mercy message and devotion.
It was in that chapel that Blessed Michael Sopoćko, St. Faustina’s confessor and spiritual director, first celebrated the Divine Mercy Sunday Mass, and preached on the Divine Mercy with the Image before the altar.
"What a joy to celebrate this beautiful day in honor of Our Lady!" Fr. Kaz said.
In his homily, Fr. Kaz spoke of Our Lady as a privileged path to the Divine Mercy of God. Prophesied in Genesis 3:15, her role in the mystery of our salvation was clearly part of the divine plan. She models for us three dimensions of life: Acknowledging the reality of God; His love for us; and what God has done for us first—the grace that undergirds all reality; sharing and proclaiming what God has done for us; and interceding for ourselves, our neighbors, the Church, and the world.
Especially in this secular age, Fr. Kaz emphasized, we have to be faithful to pray wherever we are, no matter how hostile to God. Prayer is extraordinarily powerful, and can transform even seemingly impossible situations. Amen!
Father Chris Alar, MIC, Provincial Superior, is delivering the keynote address of NACOM III, entitled “Mercy and Mary — Our Hope for a Troubled World."
Father Chris took Congress goers on a tour of the essential dogmas about Our Lady: the Immaculate Conception, Perpetual Virginity, Divine Maternity, and the Assumption, and discussed how all her special privileges and role came from the Divine Mercy of God. He emphasized that God had entrusted Divine Mercy to the Marian Fathers, according to the late Fr. Seraphim Michalenko, MIC, because He wanted the Divine Mercy message and devotion under the mantle of Mary.
“The greatest act of mercy ever bestowed on a creature was the Immaculate Conception,” Fr. Chris explained. “The second greatest act was redemption.”
His love is sufficient
Following Fr. Chris’ keynote, Good Shepherd parishioner Amanda Michelle Chang shared her testimony. Raised a cradle Catholic, she had not been living her Catholic faith for much of her young adult life. Taking marriage prep courses introduced her to Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body, which sparked a renewed interest in her faith.
She would need it — when her marriage ended, she moved from Ottawa back to Vancouver, close to family. Her young daughter struggled with the break up of her parents' marriage, and ended up hospitalized after ceasing to eat for a time. But when Amanda learned to surrender everything to God, and to trust in the Divine Mercy, she found a path forward. Her daughter is now a student at the Star of the Sea school. Amanda finds tremendous fruit from her times of prayer with Jesus and Mary, especially in Adoration.
Amanda's mother, Cynthia, is one of the leading organizers of the Asian Apostolic Congress on Mercy.
“Jesus' love is sufficient,” Amanda concluded.
Jesus as our constant Guide
Next, the Most Reverend Antonysamy Savarimuthu, Bishop of Palayamkottai, Tamil Nadu, India, offered a talk on “Jesus, Teacher of Divine Mercy in the School of Divine Mercy.”
“Sister Faustina viewed Jesus as a constant guide,” noted Bishop Savarimuthu, referring to Him as “Master” 54 times in the Diary, and “Director” and “Teacher” twice.
Of course, Jesus is shown as a teacher throughout the Gospels, “establishing humility, love, and forgiveness as essential attitudes of the Christian life,” Bishop Savarimuthu explained. “Jesus teaches mercy through His words, but also models it through His actions.”
“Jesus teaches us that prayer is bold and intimate dialogue with the Father,” Bishop Savarimuthu said, especially through giving us the Our Father prayer. "The Lord’s unique method of teaching includes: direct personal dialogue; encouragement and affirmation; gentle correction; use of symbolic visions; and instruction in prayer."
Father Donald Calloway, MIC, who will be speaking later today, offers blessings to pilgrims.
Maria, Juan, Mayra, and Lucia are members of the Hispanic Catholic Young Adult Group at Holy Rosary Cathedral in Vancouver. “I’ve been brought by a friend who introduced the Divine Mercy to me," said Maria. "She has been praying it very constantly. And just trying to know more about it and I asked her many speakers were going to come and were very knowledgeable. We all happen to know one of them, and we decided to come. And yeah, we're all trying to learn more.”
The talks really grab your attention, Maria said. "One of the speakers said Jesus is more hurt by you not trusting Him than all of your sins together, and I think that stood out to me a lot. I think sometimes we can be very hard on ourselves and not understand the amount of the love and mercy that Jesus has for us, so that has been very eye-opening.”
"We all think there’s something for everyone here," Maria concluded. "Just be open to Jesus'love and mercy and know that there’s nothing that is too big or too awful for Him to forgive.”
We see they all got a copy of the Spanish edition of Consecration to St. Joseph: The Wonders of Our Spiritual Father by Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC. Excellent choice!
Father Chris Alar, MIC, signed copies of his definitive book from Marian Press, Understanding Divine Mercy.
Students Raphael and Ethan volunteered to serve lunch to the nearly 700 Congress participants. Thanks, guys!
“The spirituality of Divine Mercy is a sign for the end times,” said Sister M. Inga Kvassayová, OLM (above). “This is not just one of the spiritualities — this is the spirituality.”
Sister Inga, a member of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, the order in which St. Faustina lived and died, addressed the topic “Spirituality of Mercy." She offered a survey, first of what a spirituality is, then of the papal teaching on the Divine Mercy message and devotion as given through St. Faustina. She highlighted the centrality of mercy in the Gospel and the Catholic faith, offering practical counsel to the Congress on how to live the spirituality of mercy today.
She quoted St. John Paul II, the Great Mercy Pope, who said that apart from Divine Mercy, there’s no other source of hope for mankind — a crucial teaching to guide us as we enter into the 2025 Jubilee of Hope. "I encourage everyone to enter into St. Faustina’s school of spirituality!"
Divine Mercy Evangelization
After Sr. Inga led the Congress in the Divine Mercy Chaplet in the 3 o’clock Hour of Great Mercy, Angel and Estrella Mijares of La Habra, California, shared their testimony. Angel had been in the same formation class of the Fortnight on Divine Mercy through the John Paul II Institute of Divine Mercy as Dr. Robert Stackpole in the 1990s.
Longtime devotees of the Divine Mercy message and devotion, they are the founders of the Divine Mercy Evangelization Movement Foundation, and have hosted the Marian Fathers and their lay collaborators at a number of events over the years.
In the last talk before supper, Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, best-selling author of Champions of the Rosary and 10 Wonders of the Rosary, offered an extensive survey of “The Rosary — Instrument of Mercy and Hope.”
Covering the whole history of the traditional Dominican Rosary, one of the most indulgenced and extraordinarily powerful devotions in the history of the Church, Fr. Donald challenged the Congress to be faithful in praying the Rosary, especially for poor sinners.
“Where would I be if those Filipino women and all the women and men in all the parishes around the world had stopped praying for sinners like me?” Fr. Calloway asked, referring to a group of Filipino women who had been praying the Rosary in the base chapel as he was in the midst of a spiritual turnaround. The whole story is told in his memoir, No Turning Back.
“May all of you, and those like you, flourish because you are Apostles of Mercy.”
Mercy is not negotiable
The next talk was by Fr. Patrice Chocholski, former general secretary of the World Apostolic Congress on Mercy and rector of the Shrine at Ars, France, honoring St. John Vianney, patron saint of parish priests.
Father Chocholski surveyed the essential Jewishness of Jesus, and how that informed Jesus’ self understanding as well as how He exercised mercy in the world. Speaking of the mystery of the oneness of justice and mercy in the divine simplicity of God as he drew deeply on the life and papal magisterium of St. John Paul II, Fr. Chocholski clearly and firmly rejected past Christian attempts to simply replace the Jewish people's salvation history with the Church. Quoting St. Paul, he spotlighted that the calls and election of the Jewish people abide. Both Jews and Christians discern the revelation of the Divine Mercy and the Divine Justice in the Word of God.
“It is not easy to see mercy, and to see mercy as it is,” Fr. Patrice noted. “Mercy is not negotiable. Otherwise it certainly isn’t serious.”
Works of Mercy
Dr. Bryan Thatcher, founder of Eucharistic Apostles of The Divine Mercy (EADM), an official apostolate of the Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, spoke next. He spotlighted the works of mercy, especially the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy. Dr. Thatcher shared the work EADM has done with the Marian Fathers in the formation of the “Mother of Mercy Village” in the Philippines and promoting prayer for the dying.
“Saint Faustina had a special love for the dying,” said Dr. Thatcher, sharing a story of a time where St. Faustina bilocated to the bedside of a dying man, interceded for him, and so saved his soul.
Dr. Thatcher concluded by encouraging all his listeners to be "Veronicas," merciful souls willing to bring water and comfort to the suffering and dying.
Hem of His Garment
The final event of Day 2 was nonetheless one of the most important, and one of the most practical. Father Mark Baron, MIC (above), the Director of the Association of Marian Helpers (also known as “Father Joseph, MIC”), introduced “The Hem of His Garment,” a special time of Eucharistic Adoration.
“You have the opportunity to have your own personal experience of Jesus,” said Fr. Mark. Four priests, each with the Eucharist exposed in a monstrance and wearing a humeral veil, stood ready to bless and pray over each Congress participant individually.
Inspired by the Gospel account of Jesus and the hemorrhaging woman (see Mark 5:25-34), the devotion takes inspiration from the deep Eucharistic spirituality of St. Maria Faustina of the Most Blessed Sacrament, the Secretary and Apostle of the Divine Mercy.
Return to main NACOM III page.
Photos by Chris Sparks and Giuseppe Mignano.
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