As I mentioned in the Page description of the Menu on my toolbar entitled Divine Mercy,  I spent the past year (2014) reading the entire Diary of St. Faustina (Helena) Kowalska. I hope to spend this next year writing on my personal reflections from that experience and some of the many individual life lessons I took away from this.

This will be my first reflection piece from that experience…

When I began this committment I knew it would be important for me to stay organized, so that I could track my obligation to read 5 entries per day.  (Yes, my God gifted me with a few anal-retentive tendencies; however, I prefer to acknowledge that He simply designed me to be “efficiently organized.”)

As I began reading through her beautiful Diary I knew I would need a way to track & monitor my daily reading commitment. I was inspired to scribble in the sidebar of my copy of the  Diary the month (listed at the top) & the day (written directly below this) at the beginning of each day’s commitment.  So…the number 3, Day 23; represented March the 23rd as my reference point. The following day’s commitment would then be scribbled at the start of the next “5 entry” series and so on.  This pattern quickly proved to work well because it afforded me the ability to always stay on track with a concrete reference point! (Especially with my ever-aging memory!)

On the random occassion, when unexpected situations prevented me from that particular day’s 5 prescribed readings, (yes I must admit that there were infrequent times when I would need to make up for a 2 or 3 day commitment at one sitting!)  I could still easily reference my self-prescribed obligation!  Also, by mapping out each day’s 5 entry logs, I gave myself the opportunity to look back for those entries which really impacted me, or perhaps tied into reflections I would later make in the days or months that lay ahead.

There was a great calm in the orderliness of it all.  And as I begin this year (2015) of personal reflection on the many graces I’ve been given from having read the Diary, there is a fondness in seeing the scribblings of the date when these moments impacted my life & created change for me.

These dates remind me that we truly do not know the hour, the time, or the place, when God’s hand will reach out and transform our hearts with the message he has in store for us. In the writings of Matthew, Chapters 24 & 25, he reminds us we must always watch for Him…

“Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” Matthew 25:13

When I began the commitment to read St. Faustina’s Diary I had no idea what lay in store and the multitude of messages my God would convey to me. Yet, He knew all along!  And thumbing through the Diary yet again…I am in awe of the grace and mercy He has shown me.  And I embrace where-ever it is He is now leading me in my visitation of this past year’s journey.

On the 29th day of January I read one of the more impactful entries for myself  (each entry made by Saint Faustina is carefully documented numerically.) This particular entry influenced my entire experience with reading the Diary.  (Saint) Faustina wrote this entry herself on the 1st of January in 1937 and I used it often to carry & focus me throughout each month of 2014 and still today.  (See my Post entitled, Inner Silence; which is a reflection on entry 162, found in her personal Diary on page 77.)

Ultimately, St. Faustina’s Diary is the record of her life experience –the journey of her soul.  She was graced by a special communion with God, and the Diary expressed her conviction that this communion ought to be the center of our lives.

Each of us have the ability to experience the power of the Blood and Water that poured out from the Heart of Jesus as a fount of mercy…for us.   We must learn to trust in this mercy so that it may help us to find the confidence and peace in the ever-present love of God.

 755 O my Jesus, teach me to open the bosom of mercy and love to everyone who asks for it.  Jesus, my Commander, teach me so that all my prayers and deeds may bear the seal of Your mercy.

hugs n’ blessings!