# Celebrating Divine Mercy Sunday with Consecration and Prayer
*2019-04-27*

> Bill Young shares his experience of celebrating Divine Mercy Sunday, including Mass, confession, and the Prayer of Consecration to Divine Mercy, and reflects on the depth of God's love.

## A Day of Worship

I began the day at St. David’s Catholic Church, where we celebrated Mass and received Holy Communion. After Mass we gathered before the image of the Divine Mercy and prayed the Prayer of Consecration to Divine Mercy. Later I traveled to St. Gregory’s in Plantation, Florida, where Father Gary gave a beautiful homily. I also went to confession there from 7:00 to 7:30 p.m., which was a profound encounter with God’s mercy.

## The Prayer of Consecration

We opened with a short invocation:

"O Font of Life, source of divine mercy, pour out your grace upon the whole world. Blood and water, flowing from the Heart of Jesus, be a fountain of mercy for us. We trust in you."

We then prayed the Our Father, Hail Mary, and the Apostles’ Creed. Following that, I offered the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ for the sins of the world, repeatedly asking the Eternal Father to have mercy on us because of Christ’s sorrowful passion.

The prayer concluded with a closing petition:

"Eternal God, whose mercy is endless, look kindly upon us and increase your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we may not despair but submit to your holy will, which is love and mercy itself. Amen."

## Reflections on Divine Mercy

St. Teresa of Calcutta once said that on Divine Mercy Sunday the gates of heaven are opened wider for sinners. I am reminded that while we are all sinners, Christ’s love is greater than our failures. The day invites us to trust in His infinite mercy and to offer ourselves, even in our weakness, as instruments of that mercy.

I also recalled a recent experience: while my house was being painted, a painter shared a story of his aunt’s death. After a period of flatlining, her monitor began beeping again, a reminder that Christ is present even at the moment of death.

These moments reinforce the truth that Divine Mercy is not just a liturgical theme but a living reality that can transform our lives and the lives of those around us.

## Living the Little Way

Inspired by St. Teresa of Calcutta, I pray:

"Merciful Father, help me follow the little way of humility and confidence. Grant me the grace to do small things with great love, to be merciful to my neighbors, and to keep before my eyes my own poverty, weakness, and sin. May my contrite heart attract your merciful love."

I ask that God may make me a saint, even if I never see the fruits of that sanctity in this life, trusting wholly in His mercy.

*Divine Mercy Sunday calls us to trust fully in Christ’s boundless love and to offer ourselves as channels of that mercy to the world.*