Marian Helper • Spring 2025 • Marian.org 17 century, transforming the convent chapel into an active parish church. Płock Sanctuary Sister Faustina arrived at the convent in Płock in May 1930. Here she was assigned to the bakery shop, so every day, many inhabitants of Płock bought baked goods and were served by Sr. Faustina. This is the place where she first experienced a vision of Jesus wearing a white garment with red and pale rays emanating from His Heart. Jesus told her to have this Image painted with the signature, “Jesus, I trust in You” (in Polish: “Jezu, ufam Tobie”), so that it could be honored throughout the world. Here, too, Jesus expressed to Sr. Faustina His desire for a Feast of Mercy on the Sunday after Easter. Today the shrine contains a chapel where the Merciful Jesus first revealed Himself to Sr. Faustina. Some of the most precious relics of the shrine include the authentic bakery with the preserved kiln and tools used for baking bread, and the floor on which St. Faustina walked. The Merciful Jesus Image In 1933, after professing her perpetual vows in Kraków, Sr. Faustina was directed by her superiors to go to the convent in Vilnius (in today’s Lithuania), where she lived until 1936. Shortly after arriving, Sr. Faustina met Fr. Michael Sopoćko, the newly-appointed confessor to the sisters, who grew to trust and support her mystical experiences. At his request, she began writing her beloved Diary. Here, too, the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy was dictated to Sr. Faustina on Sept. 13-14, 1935. The original Image of the Merciful Jesus is today venerated in the beautiful Shrine of Divine Mercy in Vilnius. As Sr. Faustina insisted that God desired the Image to become a means of grace for an aching world, Fr. Sopoćko arranged for a wellknown Vilnius artist, Eugeniusz Kazimirowski, to paint it. Convent and Tomb Sister Faustina spent the final months of her short life at the sisters’ convent in Łagiewniki, Poland, located in the southern part of Kraków. She knew this convent well, having spent her novitiate years here, and she received her habit, took the name Maria Faustina, and made her final vows in the chapel. In her final months of life, Sr. Faustina was assigned as the porter at the convent gate. Here she encountered Jesus through a poor young man. After she fed Him some soup with breadcrumbs, He let her know that “He was the Lord of heaven and earth” and vanished from her sight. During her final years while in the last stages of tuberculosis, Sr. Faustina began undergoing an invisible stigmata, feeling the sufferings of Christ in His Passion without the visible wounds. About a year before her death, Sr. Faustina received instructions from the Lord concerning the Hour of Great Mercy at 3 p.m., the time of the Lord’s death on the Cross. On Oct. 5, 1938, Sr. Faustina peacefully went to her reward, while almost immediately her emaciated body seemed to take on an unearthly beauty. On the convent building at the entrance to the chapel, a plaque points to the cell in the former convent infirmary where Sr. Faustina died. In the chapel, which joins the two wings of the convent, the side altar holds the miraculous Image of Merciful Jesus painted by Adolf Hyła. Sister Faustina’s remains were exhumed and transferred to the convent chapel in 1966. Below the Image of Merciful Jesus, the saint’s relics rest in a white marble coffin. The nearby Basilica of Divine Mercy was consecrated by Pope John Paul II in 2002. Dedicating the whole world to Divine Mercy, he said: “Today, in this Shrine, I wish solemnly to entrust the world to Divine Mercy. I do so with the burning desire that the message of God’s merciful love, proclaimed here through Saint Faustina, may be made known to all the peoples of the earth and fill their hearts with hope.” Stephen J. Binz is the author of The Way of Mercy: Pilgrimage in Catholic Poland, winner of the Catholic Media Association Book Award for “Pilgrimages/Catholic Travel.” The lavishly illustrated book from Marian Press (B65-PPLM) is available on ShopMercy.org. The convent in Vilnius, Lithuania, where Sr. Faustina met Fr. Michael Sopoćko and received the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy from Jesus. The porter’s gate at the convent in Łagiewniki, Poland, where Sr. Faustina encountered Jesus as a beggar.
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