The Year Of Mercy Begins Today--Don't Miss It!!!!!

Repetition of sin lulls our conscience to sleep.  The Year of Mercy invites us examine our lives and seek God’s mercy for those areas where we have fallen short of living up to the glory of God.  This is an amazing opportunity for conversion.
 
How will you celebrate the Year of Mercy? Will it make a difference in the way you celebrate the rest of the Advent season?  How about Christmas?  When we turn the page on the calendar will you still celebrate the Year of Mercy in January?  Indeed, how will mercy be celebrated during Lent for you?  Will particular feast days and solemnities take on special significance this year?  How will you celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus on Friday, June 3?  How will you celebrate the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14?  I realize that these dates are a long way off, but I am asking you to be planning ahead.  Please do not let this Year of Mercy pass without growing closer to our Lord and with one another.
 
How will your prayer be impacted on a daily basis because we are in the Year of Mercy?  Will you make a commitment to grow your prayer life?  The options are numerous.

• Liturgy of the Hours
• Eucharistic Adoration
• The Rosary and other Marian devotions
• The Chaplet of Divine Mercy and other devotions connected to saints
• The Way of the Cross
• Lectio Divina

 
Will you more attentively celebrate the sacramental life of the Church?  Will you enter into the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with full, conscious, and active participation?  Will you recognize and meditate upon the many ways we seek God’s mercy at each and every Mass?  Will the Scripture Readings speak to you more deeply about God’s mercy?  Will you pay extra special attention to the parables of mercy from Luke’s Gospel?
 
See the following:
Luke 7: 36-50     (Two debtors and creditor)
Luke 10: 25-37   (The Good Samaritan)
Luke 15: 1-10     (The lost sheep and lost coin)
Luke 15: 11-32   (The Prodigal Son)
Luke 16: 19-31   (The rich man and the beggar Lazarus)
Luke 18: 1-8       (The judge and the widow)
Luke 18: 9-14     (The Pharisee and the Publican in the temple)
 
How will you more effectively live out the Corporal Works of Mercy?
 
CORPORAL WORKS OF MERCY
 
Feed the hungry                                                                       Matthew 25: 35
Give drink to the thirsty                                                      Matthew 25: 35
Welcome the stranger                                                          Matthew 25: 35
Clothe the naked                                                                      Matthew 25: 36
Visit the sick                                                                                Matthew 25: 36
Visit the imprisoned                                                                Matthew 25: 36
Bury the dead                                                    Tobit 1: 17 and Tobit 12: 12
 
How will you more fully embrace the Spiritual Works of Mercy?
 
SPIRITUAL WORKS OF MERCY
1. Counsel the doubtful;
2. Instruct the ignorant;
3. Admonish sinners;
4. Comfort the afflicted;
5. Forgive offenses willingly;
6. Bear wrongs patiently;
7. Pray for the living and the dead.
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Read Psalm 136 and realize that “His mercy endures forever.”