Saint Stanislaus Papczynski — The Life and Writings

hands. Our deepest source is in Him. He gives ultimate meaning to our lives, work, and love. Remembering the dead, praying for the dead is amanifestation of remembering that reality. Wewant it for thosewho have already left us, andwewant it for ourselves, because we were created and saved for it. Saint Stanislaus and his spiritual sons awaken in us this kind of sensitivity. 5. esteemed and dear Marian Fathers, together with you we rejoice in the elevation of your Father Founder to the glory of the altars. you had long waited for this moment. His canon- ization testifies to the potency and timeliness of his charism, of which you are heirs, custodians, and continuers. The Church needs your witness and your service. Significant is the fact that Fr. Stanislaus is declared a saint during the extraordinary Jubilee year of Mercy. He left us the example of a man and a priest with a great heart, concerned about his neighbor’s poverty and not indifferent to his fate. The mystery of Divine Mercy seems to be the answer to the great problems of our troubled world, unsettled with tensions, violence, blind terrorism, and armed conflicts. Hence our plea for God’s mercy on our world. This plea has been amplified thanks to the humble Sr. Faustina, who lived in the 20 th century marked by the rule of inhuman totalitarian systems. This call was also repeated by St. John Paul II, who raised the whole Church’s awareness of this issue. He did so by issuing the en- cyclical Dives in Misericordia ( On the Mercy of God ), by intro- ducing in the Church the Feast of Divine Mercy, as well as entrusting the world to Divine Mercy in krakow in 2002, which happened in the last years of his long pontificate and, in a cer- tain sense, is his pastoral testament. Today I would like to thank the Marian Fathers for their pioneering and long-time work of spreading the Divine Mercy message and devotion in many countries, especially in the United States, england, and Poland I also would like to take this extraordinary opportunity to extend my thanks to the Congregation of Marian Fathers of the S AINT S TANISLAUS P APCZYNSKI 194