MERCY & THE EASTER SEASON
Wait a minute. So Jesus, not the Church, established this
sacrament? Where does the Bible say he did that?
3, 2013 | By Marcellino D'Ambrosio, Ph.D.
Several years ago,
the Catholic Church designated the Sunday after Easter as “Divine Mercy Sunday.”
That raises two very important questions – what exactly is “mercy” anyway, and
what does it have to do with the Easter season?
Mercy is not just
pity. Neither is it simply sparing someone the punishment that they deserve.
No, mercy can be defined as love’s response to suffering. When mercy encounters
suffering, it ultimately seeks to alleviate it. God the Father is so “rich in
mercy” (Ephesian 2:4) that Paul calls him “the Father of all mercies and the
God of all comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3).
Jesus is the perfect
human image of the Father’s mercy. When he meets those suffering from hunger,
he feeds them. When he encounters people suffering from physical sickness, he
heals them. But true mercy is not superficial, but truly radical. And Jesus
recognizes that the deepest suffering in human life, the root cause of all
other suffering, is sin. Sin debases us, robbing us of our dignity, weakening
and even rupturing our connection with the source of our life, namely, God, our
loving Father. Sin, then, is not just a transgression of some arbitrary law.
No, it creates a wound in us that can fester and, if left unattended, corrupt
us entirely. It gives the Prince of Darkness a foothold in our hearts which he
then tries to use to gain complete control of our lives. True mercy seeks to
alleviate this deeper suffering that can potentially lead to eternal suffering.
It was to address
this most profound of all wounds that Jesus gave up his life. And the risen
Christ instituted the sacrament of penance to apply the medicine of mercy, won
on Calvary, to each individual sinner at the moment of their deepest need.
Right there, in John’s gospel, on Easter
Sunday afternoon. Despite the locked doors, he stands amidst the apostles and
says “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Jesus is the original “apostle”
of the Father – the word means “one who is sent.” As he was sent on a mission
of mercy, so he sends out his “apostles” on the same mission. He breathes on
them and says “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive men’s sins, they are
forgiven them; if you hold them bound, they are held bound” (John 20:19-22).
Do you have a problem with the Church intruding on what you
think ought to remain between just you and God?
You’ll have to take
that up with Jesus. It was his idea. From the looks of this text, he gave the
apostles and their successors, whom we call bishops, a great deal of authority
in this matter. But he also gave them a great deal of spiritual power. The same
Holy Spirit, who was responsible for bringing order out of chaos (Gen 1) and
causing a virgin to conceive, is breathed upon the apostles by the Risen
Christ. He is the Spirit of Mercy, the Spirit of healing, the Spirit of
liberation and resurrection.
This means that going
to confession is about more than an appointment with some official of the
institutional church. It is rather an encounter with a man who has been
anointed with the Spirit of Mercy to stand in the place of Christ (in persona Christi) and serve as an
instrument of the divine physician. True, this instrument is a sinner who is
himself in need of mercy, much like Peter and Doubting Thomas. But he is
nonetheless an instrument of God’s healing and merciful love. That is the case
whether or not he is a wise counselors or exhibits exceptional holiness of
life.
The Spirit that
Christ breathed on the apostles on the first Easter afternoon has been passed
on to bishops and priests through the sacrament of Holy Orders. That means that
Jesus Christ is the one who comes to meet you in the sacrament of penance and
reconciliation. And he comes not just to forgive, but also to heal, to
liberate, strengthen and transform.
His merciful love
means that he did not die simply to “cover our sins” and wipe them off God’s
record book, leaving us the same miserable creatures we’d always been. No, his
mercy kills the infection, heals the wound, and breaks the bonds.
In the sacrament of
reconciliation, Jesus invites me, like he did Lazarus, to come out of the place
of darkness and decay. And he says to his priestly confessors the same thing he
said to the people standing around Lazarus’s tomb: “unbind him, and let him go
free!”
That’s divine mercy.
I don’t know about you, but I want as much of it as I can get!
Dr.
Marcellino D’Ambrosio writes from Texas. For his resources on parenting and
family life or information on his pilgrimages to Rome and the Holy Land, visit www.crossroadsinitiative.com
or call 1.800.803.0118
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