Sister Faustina Kowalska: Her LIfe and MIssion

na tu re active and practical, she would have a tendency to p u t the work en tru s ted to h e r into immediate action, while God’s will was - as we may suppose today - not th a t she should actively perform something, b u t th a t through h e r should be revealed the full concept of the devotion to the Divine Mercy, and the groundwork for a new Congregation; b u t someone else was to bring th a t congregation to life. Thus, the illness was a n a tu ra l brake, which would inh ib it hasty impatience aimed a t pu tting God’s plan into action as rapidly as m igh t be, w ithout unde rs tand ing th a t i t had not yet been sufficiently absorbed, and clear, and th a t above all it was needful to concentrate on this. The s ta tem en t th a t S ister F au s t in a received her g rea t mission as a p a t ien t with advanced tuberculosis may seem shocking to certain people. In reality, i t is not such an exception. We can find sim ilar precedents w ithout looking far. A countryman of S ister Faus tina , St. Maximillian Kolbe, slightly older th an she, bu t active a t the same time, also began h is g rea t mission­ ary work as a tuberculous p a t ien t with advanced changes in h is lungs. Similarly, the P rim a te of the Polish Millennium of Ch ristian ity , Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, a t th e time he was being consecrated priest, was not predicted to have a long life, and he him self then prayed th a t God m ight j u s t g ran t him one yea r as a p ries t before He took him to Himself. Both the examples given also show th a t the process of tuberculosis run s by no means in a uniform manner, and how ha rd i t is to give a correct prognosis. In F a the r Kolbe and in Cardinal Wyszynski the disease, though very advanced, fortuna te ly became arrested while in S ister F au s tina ’s case i t ran a dramatic course. I emphasize th a t i t was dramatic, not tragic. God tru s ted he r love: S is ter F au s tin a in very difficult conditions transformed her overwhelming sufferings into a priceless constructive element, supported by which the work en tru s ted to he r could develop. Every suffer­ ing she encountered, regardless of w he ther it was 296