Fr. Landry on the Mercy of Jesus

"There are many ways to live out the Year of Mercy, but I think perhaps the most fruitful is to ponder and imitate Jesus' own merciful example. The theme of this Year of Mercy is 'Merciful like the Father,' and no one has shown us how to emulate the Father's Mercy better than the 'image of the invisible God' himself, the one who identified himself to St. Faustina Kowalska as 'Mercy Incarnate.'

"All of Jesus' life is a manifestation of God's loving mercy, but when we look at the demonstrations of that merciful love in the Gospel, we see that they fall into five general categories. In Greek, the evangelists introduce them all by the same verb, splanchnizomai, which in English is normally translated as Jesus' 'heart was moved with pity.' Since splanchna, however, means 'viscera' or 'guts,' a more literal translation would be that Jesus was 'sick to his stomach' with compassion as he saw people in need.

"Jesus did five different things in response to these intense cramps of compassion, things that the Church continues to do and every Christian is called to do with particular focus during this Year of Mercy. . . ."

In a recent commentary, Father Roger J. Landry (a priest of the Diocese of Fall River, MA, who works for the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations) reflected on these responses of Jesus (including teaching, healing, feeding, forgiving, and praying.

To access Fr. Landry's complete essay, please visit:

Boston Pilot: Echoes: Echoes. Receiving and Extending Jesus' Five-Fold Mercy (19 JAN 2016)