CORRECTION AND SUGGESTION

Dear Friends:
In my last sharing, I misspelled St. Faustina Kowalska’s last name as “Kowalski.” This is to acknowledge my error, with apologies to all, particularly to St. Faustina.
I take advantage of this orthographical mishap to recommend to all of you (those who haven’t yet)  the reading of her Diary. I first approached it with apprehension, fearing it might be just sentimental and devotional banalities oozing from the pen of a pious nun. How happily wrong I was proven, when I read the awesome journey of a paschal and happily crucified soul, plumbing the depths of Trinitarian love!!

I was particularly attracted to  the oft-repeated words she places in the lips of Jesus: “Be not afraid,” or their equivalent (“Diary,” 143, 215, 219,258, 430, 435. 541, 639, 1180, 1181). It is the most frequently-used expression in the Scriptures. From Abraham and Sarah to Mary, the Mother of Jesus, all the defining figures in Salvation History hear the same thing: “Be not afraid.” Faustina follows this tradition.

If I may be allowed to marshal scholarly support for my recommendation of Faustina’s “Diary,” I refer you to Harvey Egan, S.J., the American Jesuit who did his Ph.D. under Karl Rahner, and is arguably one of  the two or three pre-eminent theologians of mysticism in the world (professor at Boston College, Weston, and Santa Barbara). Egan considers Faustina a “prophetic mystic,” meaning simply that her line of mysticism is essential to the life and theology of the Church.

Oremus pro invicem

Sixto
At the sunset of our lives, we
will be judged by love
St. John of the Cross
“Sayings of Light and Love,” 59
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