The Second apostolic mission of St. Faustina: The Diary of St. Faustina.

 

The Diary of Saint Faustina Kowalska is one of the gems of mystical literature. She wrote it in Vilnius and Kraków in 1934 – 1938, as Jesus Himself had told her to do. Also her confessors, Father Michał Sopoćko in Vilnius and Father Józef Andrasz S.J. in Kraków, instructed her to write it, and the superiors of the Congregation gave her their consent. We know that Sister Faustina burnt the original version of the Diary, because when Father Sopoćko was away, she yielded to the persuasion of an alleged angel (in reality Satan). Later, her Vilnian spiritual director told her to reconstruct what she had destroyed.

 

So, the Diary we have today, especially its first notebook, does not follow a chronological order. She wrote all the entries in secret in her free time when she was not carrying out her monastic duties. She also wrote in hospital, where she had more time and, at Father Sopoćko’s request, she underlined all of Jesus’ words. The last entries to which she put a date were written in June 1938, so she stopped writing her Diary three months before her death. Above all, the Diary contains the message of God’s merciful love for humankind, which Sister Faustina was required to pass on to the Church and the world. This makes her Diary a special work, as the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, said, “the gospel of mercy written from the 20th-century perspective.”

 

In her Diary, Sister Faustina depicts her meetings with God and her extraordinary relations with the supernatural world: meetings with Jesus, Our Lady, angels, saints, souls suffering in Purgatory, and Satan’s attacks against her. Her great prophetic mission became an integral part of her life – she was to remind the world about the truth of God’s merciful love for each human person, and to preach it with a new strength.

 

When Sister Faustina wrote the Diary, she realised that it would probably be published “for the consolation of souls,” however, she wanted it to be done after her death. So, she attached the following note to her work: “Jesus, nobody may read the notebooks and notes – first Father Andrasz or Father Sopoćko must check them, because the notes contain the secrets of my conscience. It is God’s will to make them accessible to souls for their consolation. Except for my superiors, none of the sisters should be allowed to read the notes until they have been published. Kraków, during my retreat, 3 April 1938, Sister Faustina.

 

The Diary of St. Faustina is currently one of the most widely-read religious works. A large number of copies have been sold. It has been very popular because, as Jesus said, it was written for the consolation and encouragement of souls. Reading St. Faustina’s Diary has given many people a deeper knowledge of God’s merciful love, and helped them come back to Him and make their love more profound.