To keep things in perspective, I wish to post this:
(And no, I don't normally endorse or post things from Traditio! I disagree quite strongly with "Father" Moderator on most issues relating to the Crisis in the Church)
http://www.traditio.com/tradlib/faq11.txtDIVINE MERCY
A local devotion under this title, which is associated with one Sr.
Faustina and a chaplet of the Divine Mercy, was approved by the Ordinary of
Vilnius, Poland, in 1936 and from there spread rapidly, especially after World
War II in the United States.
It appears that Sr. Faustina could not write, except for a few lines
phonetically. Most of her "diary" was concocted by her sisters after her
death. Because of the incongruities of the dairy (different handwriting,
different use of terms), the devotion was suppressed, and the book of her
diary was placed on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum [Index of Forbidden
Books]. This decision was upheld by Pope John XXIII in 1958/59.
In early 1978, a Polish cardinal petitioned the Vatican to remove the
suppression of the devotion, which was being practiced without sanction in
his diocese, and the Vatican replied in the negative, confirming the
suppression. By this time the original devotion had been illegally replaced by
an oecuмenized version framed in New Order terminology -- with substantially
changed prayers to promote non-Catholic beliefs and the heresy of universal
salvation. Later in 1978 a Polish pope was elected, and the now modernized
version, twice condemned, was now entered onto the Novus Ordo liturgical
calendar on the Octave of Easter.
The Octave Day of a feast, particularly of the greatest feast,
Easter, is a significant day in itself. The Divine Mercy cult is thus in
contravention of the focus of the Catholic liturgy for that day,
which is on the Resurrection of Our Lord and faith in His Divinity. As Dom
Gueranger, the noted Benedictine liturgical scholar, commented in his
fifteen-volume Liturgical Year: "Such is the solemnity of this Sunday that
not only is it of greater double rite, but no feast, however great, can ever
be kept upon it." That is the Roman Catholic attitude, which the New Order
spurned.
Not surprisingly, the cult in post-Conciliar times is increasing in its
association with another cult, that is, the cult of "Catholic" Charismaticism.
This Charismatic Movement is far from true Catholicism, but is a derivative of
the Protestant heresy, based on the erroneous notion that emotional experience
always accompanies the conferral of grace, whereas the Catholic doctrine is that
the only sensible indication of the conferral of grace is the Sacrament itself.
Perhaps the cult's association with New Age ideas is why it has become lionized
in recent years, whereas popes up to JPII have condemned it.
Is it any wonder that the New Order pushes this corrupted devotion over
the traditional devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus? The devotion to the
Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is a much more ancient devotion, having grown in the
early Middle Ages through the efforts of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a Doctor of
the Church, and St. Gertrude. However, it was in the latter half of the
seventeenth century that news of three private revelations to St. Margaret Mary
Alocoque concerning the Sacred Heart swept the Catholic world and shortly led to
the establishment of a feast on the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi
(the Friday after the Second Sunday after Pentecost).
The Feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, which was extended to
the Universal Church by Pope Pius IX in 1856, became a feast of atonement for
human ingratitude toward God in spite of the supreme sacrifice of Calvary.
The theme for the new Mass and the Divine Office was taken from the words of
Our Lord to St. Margaret Mary: "Behold the Heart which has loved men so
greatly, but which has been given so little love in return."
Devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus has been richly
indulgenced by the Church, and a Litany of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is
one of only five approved for public recitation. Given the apparent New Order's
corruption of the original devotion to the divine mercy and the pushing
of this Charismatic novelty condemned by two popes, traditional Catholics will
continue to stand with the more ancient and universally-approved devotion to the
Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and reject this New Order novelty.