 Painting of St. Faustina holding a Divine Mercy image. Painted by Janis Balabon for Fr. Seraphim Michalenko. |
This Site
Here you will find St. Faustina's entire diary online in various languages, and you can also freely download high-quality Divine Mercy images. This site offers images without a signature so that you can add the signature in your own language. This website also contains information about the Divine Mercy message and devotion which every soul should interiorize.
There are many outstanding Divine Mercy websites, which contain much more information than this one. The goal of creating this site was not to repeat all of that information. Rather, this website was created mainly in response to the surprising lack of quality Divine Mercy images available on the Internet for download. This absence is very surprising, as the Divine Mercy image is one of the few divinely mandated or created images (others include the Shroud of Turin, the Tilma of Our Lady of Guadelupe, and the Miraculous Medal image). This image has been completely accepted by the Catholic Church and is on display in most churches. Not only that, but this image is distinguished from all these other images, because it is actually a vessel of grace in and of itself. As Jesus said to St. Faustina "I am offering people a vessel with which they are to keep coming for graces to the fountain of mercy. That vessel is this image with the signature: 'Jesus, I trust in You.' (Diary, 327)". Jesus also said, "By means of this Image I shall be granting many graces to souls; so let every soul have access to it. (Diary, 570)".
Brief History of the Divine Mercy Message and Devotion
From the early years of her life until her death at the age of 33 in 1938, Our Lord Jesus Christ communed with a young Polish nun named Sister Helena Faustina Kowalska in a way "so intimately as with no other creature (Diary, 707)". Jesus chose this simple, uneducated nun as the instrument by which to exhort the world to TRUST IN HIS MERCY. Out of obedience to the command given to her by Jesus through her spiritual director, Father Sopocko, and later at the command given to her by Jesus directly, St. Faustina kept a diary:
"Secretary of My most profound mystery, know that yours is an exclusive intimacy with Me. Your task is to write down everything that I make known to you about My mercy, for the benefit of those who by reading these things will be comforted in their souls and will have the courage to approach Me. I therefore want you to devote all your free moments to writing. "But, O Lord, shall I always have a moment, at least a brief one, in which to write?" And Jesus answered, It is not for you to think about that. Only do as much as you can, and I will always arrange things so that you will easily be able to do what I ask of you... (Diary, 1693)".
Even before her death in 1938, the devotion to the Divine Mercy as revealed in her diary had begun to spread. Although some of her peers suspected her intimate communion with the Lord, no one, other than her superiors who promoted this work of Divine Mercy, was aware that it had come about through her. By 1953, 25 million pieces of Divine Mercy literature had been distributed throughout the world.
Then in 1958, the prophecy which the Holy Spirit had inspired St. Faustina to record in her diary began to come true: "There will come a time when this work, which God is demanding so very much, will be as though utterly undone. And then God will act with great power, which will give evidence of its authenticity. It will be a new splendor for the Church... (Diary, 378)." And so, the Holy See, having received erroneous and confusing translations of diary entries, which it was unable to verify due to existing political conditions, forbade the spreading of the Divine Mercy message and devotion in the form proposed by the diary.
In 1978 the ban was completely lifted thanks to Cardinal Karol Wojtyla (Pope John Paul II) and the uncovering of many documents that were not available in 1959. Since then, the message and devotion to the Divine Mercy has spread rapidly, helped along by the support of Pope John Paul II who is known as the "Mercy Pope" and who said that spreading the message of God's mercy was his "special task". Pope John Paul II beatified St. Faustina in 1993 and canonized her on Divine Mercy Sunday in 2000 as the 1st saint of the 3rd millenium. Pope John Paul II died on April 2, the vigil of Divine Mercy Sunday, in 2005.