Saint John Paul II in the visions of Saint Faustina
“I Saw a Hand Finishing the Temple”
Wojtyła and Faustina, two persons thanks to whom the truth about God's Mercy reached hundreds of millions of people in the world - they did not meet during their lifetime. And yet Sister Faustina saw Pope Wojtyła in 1937. She saw him in one of the visions she described in the Diary. On March 23, 1937, and it was Holy Tuesday, she saw her canonization in a convent in Krakow: “Suddenly, God’s presence took hold of me, and at once I saw myself in Rome, in the Holy Father’s chapel and at the same time I was in our chapel. And the celebration of the Holy Father and the entire Church was closely connected with our chapel and, in a very special way, with our Congregation. And I took part in the solemn celebration simultaneously here and in Rome, for the celebration was so closely connected with Rome that, even as I write, I cannot distinguish the two, but I am writing it down as I saw it. I saw the Lord Jesus in our chapel, exposed in the monstrance on the high altar. The chapel was adorned as for a feast, and on that day anyone who wanted to come was allowed in. The crowd was so enormous that the eye could not take it all in. Everyone was participating in the celebrations with great joy, and many of them obtained what they desired. The same celebration was held in Rome, in a beautiful church, and the Holy Father, with all the clergy, was celebrating this Feast, and then suddenly I saw Saint Peter, who stood between the altar and the Holy Father. I could not hear what Saint Peter said but I saw that the Holy Father understood his words.”
(Diary 1044)
Faustina saw what was to happen sixty-three years later - she did not know how it would happen that the canonization would take place simultaneously in the Vatican and in Łagiewniki, and - as we know today - was possible thanks to satellite connections and transmission trough television in Łagiewniki and St. Peter's Square. Faustina saw the Holy Father who " he understood the speech" of Saint Peter. The sanctity of Sister Faustina was announced on April 30, 2000 by John Paul II. Faustina therefore had to see him, his face. In March 1937, she saw Pope Karol Wojtyla.
Karol Wotyla, a 17-year-old young man, did not even think about the priesthood. Lover of literature, especially drama, and theater. He played on the stage of amateur theater in Wadowice, co-directed the first plays, and discussed the meaning and power of the word with Mieczysław Kotlarczyk, the later founder of the Rhapsodic Theater. He associated his future with the theater. With time he was entering more and more into the "mystery of the word" and getting closer to the mystery of the Word - the Incarnate Word. However, Sister Faustina, who had reached the highest unity of the soul's with God, gifted with numerous charisms, including seeing events from the future, knew that she was right. Before, in 1933, she met Father Michael Sopocko in Vilnius, her spiritual director and assistant in spreading the message of Divine Mercy, she saw his face twice in visions.
In Sister Faustina's Diary, there is one more description of the vision, which, as we can guess, concerns John Paul II. On May 8, 1938, i.e. five months before her death, Sister Faustina had a vision related to the development of God's Mercy. “Today, I saw two enormous pillars implanted in the ground; I had implanted one of them, and a certain person, S.M., the other.
We had done so with unheard-of effort, much fatigue and difficulty. And when I had implanted the pillar, I myself wondered where such extraordinary strength had come from, And I recognized that I had not done this by my own strength, but with the power which came from above. These two pillars were close to each other, in the area of the image. And I saw the image, raised up very high and hanging from these two pillars. In an instant, there stood a large temple, supported both from within and from without, upon these two pillars. I saw a hand finishing the temple, but I did not see the person. There was a great multitude of people, inside and outside the temple, and the torrents issuing from the Compassionate Heart of Jesus were flowing down upon everyone.” (Dairy1689)
This vision of Sister Faustina can be interpreted in two ways: as building a community united by the worship of God's Mercy, the center of which is the image of Merciful Jesus with the signature “Jesus, I Trust in You”, and as building a material temple.
It is also possible, in my opinion, to combine both these interpretations. The foundations for the devotion to Divine Mercy, like pillars from the vision, were laid by Sister Faustina, a person named by her as S.M. that is, Father Michael Sopocko, and a third person, whose only hand she saw and who is crowning the work.
The culmination of the work, i.e. the fulfillment of Jesus' wishes related to the cult of God's Mercy, was the establishment of Divine Mercy Sunday a week after Easter.
It was announced in 2000 by John Paul II, who two years later, in 2002, consecrated the Basilica of Divine Mercy in Łagiewniki as the Divine Mercy Center in World. I have no doubts that John Paul II was the person who crowned the work of proclaiming the Divine Mercy started by Sister Faustina. The hand in the vision of Sister Faustina belonged to him.
Until Tomorrow
fr. george