Perhaps the most moving moment of divinely-inspired human solidarity in our lifetimes happened on June 2nd, 1979. Do you remember when it happened? I sure wish I did.
No, it wasn’t the Seattle Supersonics winning a national championship. Although that moment in Northwest sports history may be the reason many of us don’t remember this divinely-inspired moment of human solidarity.
On June 2, 1979, newly elevated Polish Archbishop Karol Wojtyla, John Paul the Second, returned to his homeland for the first time as Pope.
As he spoke his homily at Victory Square in Old Town Warsaw, the crowd began a chant that would be heard around the world. The Polish people forced into a collective society by Soviet oppression, started to collectively shout, “We want God. We want God. We want God.”
That moment and Papal visit uplifted a nation’s spirit and sparked the formation of the Solidarity movement a few months later which eventually blossomed into freedom and human rights in Poland and all throughout the Eastern Block.
Historians point to that moment as the day the Berlin Wall began to crumble. Soviet Communism would cease to exist a decade later when the Berlin Wall was knocked down piece by piece in a joyous celebration of humanity’s triumph over oppression and tyranny. This is one of those pieces of the Berlin Wall. You want a sign of God’s mercy in our lifetime: it’s this little piece of a great wall that was used to crush human dignity.
God is the great gathering force of humanity. He gathers us together as a people and gives us strength to overcome even the darkest forces in our world.
Jesus is the culmination of God’s plan to unite us as His people. In fact, some call Jesus the Supreme Divine Magnet connecting us to one another.
I vividly remember Christmas of 1981. As a show of solidarity to the people of Poland, our family lit a candle and placed it in the window of our home. President Reagan had asked all Americans to do this in his annual Christmas address. It was our way of showing spiritual unity with people struggling for freedom from oppression.
At that same moment, a young Pole named Mirek Sztajno was studying for his PhD in astrophysics and courting a young nurse who would become his wife, Anna. The two were both caught up in the Solidarity movement and for the first time felt hope for the future. But there were dark hours too.
For the past four years in deacon formation, Mirek has been my good friend and seatmate at our deacon formation weekends. He and I were united in spirit then and we are united in spirit now thanks to the mercy of Christ Jesus.
He shared a beautiful story with me about how he and Anna’s first son Michael was born just a few weeks after the communist government imposed the “Marshall Law” in Poland in 1982.
He said it was a very difficult time for the family and something they will never forget.
They could not buy anything since the shops were completely empty and they urgently needed powdered milk for Michael since Anna could not produce enough milk.
Desperate, they went to a nearby parish to ask for help. Now, here are two highly educated people (a PhD and a nurse) and they could not get powdered milk in a country that was considered the breadbasket of Europe.
Without any check or extra questioning the sister who was in charge in the parish office gave the family powdered milk from their food bank. The milk was found in relief supplies sent from abroad.
It was a very difficult moment for Anna and Mirek, but God’s mercy was a light in the darkness.
Why do I bring up Poland and Solidarity?
Today we celebrate the solemnity Divine Mercy Sunday, started by another Pole.
Sister Faustina Kowalska had visions and visitations with Jesus and shared conversations with Christ. He asked her to paint the vision of his Merciful Divinity being poured out from his sacred heart.
He asked Sister Faustina to establish Divine Mercy Sunday, the first Sunday after Easter. Jesus wanted humankind to take refuge in Him to be free from all oppression from sin.
In her diary she wrote of one of those conversations. Jesus told her: “Every soul believing and trusting in My mercy will obtain it.”
Jesus said to Sister Faustina one day: "Humanity will never find peace until it turns with trust to Divine Mercy."
Jesus promised if you’ve gone to confession recently and take communion on Divine Mercy Sunday “complete forgiveness of sins and punishment” will be your reward.
In other words, a soul is granted freedom from the oppression of sin.
The human spirit doesn’t function well when it’s oppressed. Just ask the people of Poland who remember 40 years of Soviet occupation and oppression.
I’m sure many of you remember what happened one year ago today. Pope John Paul II (the former Karol Wojtyla) was Beatified in Rome, the first step on his path to sainthood.
John Paul II instituted Divine Mercy Sunday as an annual liturgical celebration in the year 2-thousand and at the same time canonized Sister Kowalska.
The Polish Pontiff was Christ’s emissary on earth and made it his mission to see that those living under oppression and tyranny experience freedom and peace, but most of all His Divine Mercy.
Christ wants the same for you and me … and blessed us with Divine Mercy Sunday as a sign for His people that we don’t have to live under oppression. Freedom is ours if we just ask Christ for His Divine Mercy.
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