News reports say that 15,000 people came to Divine Mercy Sunday in Stockbridge, Massachusetts this year. This is, by a good 3,000 people, many more than they expected, and while not the most that have ever come, it was by all reports, this was probably the worst day for weather we've had since Pope John Paul II formally declared the Sunday after Easter to be Divine Mercy Sunday in 2000, and it's probably a miracle that so many came. Oh, yes, we're insane, us "Jesus freaks"! LOL So, my friend Ron, my 15-year old son, and I, packed a lunch, our umbrellas, and our Divine Mercy chaplets, and headed out. Ron was convinced the rain would stop eventually. It did. On Monday....

Rain was torrential, and the weather hovered in the 40's (F). My son missed going to Confession on Saturday, so right off we had to go stand in line. It wasn't long.... but it wasn't exciting either, LOL. Yet as we stood in line for Confession, huddling under our umbrellas, spirits around us were good, and we could hear people singing "Immaculate Mary" and "Amazing Grace", as the wind tried to blow our umbrellas out of our hands.

Ron decided that he was all set, and didn't need to stand in line for Confession. He decided to try to go find somewhere to stay dry - silly him! There wasn't anywhere, really! He wandered off, I saw him standing hunched under a tree at one point. We caught up with him later, poor thing, and pulled him inside one of the tents, where we stood up and had lunch. He just couldn't get over how many people had come in such bad weather for a religious event. "They'd never get this kind of turnout for the Middlefield Fair, in this kind of weather", he'd say, with the rain dripping down his nose.

And, he missed out on the conversation with the lady from New Jersey, the one with the lime green boots, as we talked about "offering it up" and how many souls might be getting out of Purgatory today, if we all "offered it up" - and does it count for the whole day, or does it count every time some ache, pain, wind gust, or burst of rain down your collar hits you? Would one "offer-it" just nudge a soul closer, or would it completely clean them up and send them on their way? We decided that since we were pretty cold and extremely wet that whatever it was, it was the max, lol.

We all almost fell over laughing when some wit (probably me) commented that hypothermia was a great excuse for having a confession that went something like, "Forgive me father, for I have sinned.... but I forget what all my sins were because I was in line in the freezing rain for too long, but gee I'm really, honestly, truly sorry for whatever they were." We agreed that this type of confession would most definitely make the line move much, much faster!

My son thought it was hysterical when he realized that not only were his fingers cold, but they were waterlogged - his fingernails were white! But he was so good about it all! We had to stand up the whole time. We never sat down until after Communion, when, as typical, people started heading for the parking lots. My poor friend couldn't take it any more, and he left as soon as he got Communion too. But, plenty of seats opened up on the benches then, (out in the field where they had Mass) so my son and I staggered over and sat down. The benches were soaking wet, but we didn't care - we were drenched anyway. We huddled under my umbrella, and stayed through until the end of the Mercy chaplet, and the blessing of objects. Then we stumbled back down the hill to the buses.

The homily given by Cardinal O'Malley was wonderful. He is a very gentle, humble person. I could have listened to him talk all day - even with the wind and rain.

He began by mentioning that the deacon who read the Gospel reading had just been ordained, and then told a funny story about how when he was first ordained, he was stationed at a jail, and his first homily, he decided to talk about a bunch of famous Biblical escapes, such as Daniel escaping from the lions den, and St. Paul escaping from Rome. He laughed, and said that 6 prisoners were "inspired" to escape that night!

He then talked about the readings - how the early Christians cared for each other, and implicitly trusted in the Lord's mercy. They gave everything, and held nothing back, and they wanted for nothing, and how we are called to care for each other. That while we don't sell our houses, we are called to look into the eyes of our neighbor and love them, to do the hard things, not only because God asks us to - but because Jesus has done these things for us, already. That we should take the message of Divine Mercy to everyone, that we should believe in God's mercy, believe in God's love. "And the victory that conquers the world is our faith." That we should not look at the chaos and despair, but at the love. He talked about Thomas, of course, and how Thomas had to have Christ's resurrection proved to him - but also how his affirmation of faith was one of the most simply beautiful in Scripture - "My Lord and my God!" - if a transcript comes out, I will send it to you - it was wonderful hearing him speak. I almost forgot the rain - and that's saying something!

On the way home, my son and I stopped at the Blandford rest stop to grab a bit of something hot and use the rest rooms. His coat was soaking wet, and he left it in the car. He's 6' 2" tall, and he is noticable. The kid was wearing a rather pro-life t-shirt - black, with a white cross on the front, with a red baby-sized hand-print, that said, "The Cross we all bear, abortion" on the front, and on the back it said something like, "46,000,000 killed from 1973 - 2005 - Stop killing my generation" - or something like that - oh - he made a hit, let me tell you, LOL - I think he forgot he was wearing it. He's been pretty self-conscious about wearing these shirts in public since he got them - but he was really pleased with the reaction - two men told him that they loved his shirt, and one wanted to know where he got it. Another guy, in his 20's started the "what if it's rape" argument, and my son stepped right up to the plate - "but you can't sentance the baby to death - the baby didn't DO anything!" - I'm so proud of my son sometimes!

One thing, though, that I thought was very sad - you won't find any mention of year's Divine Mercy Sunday events in either the Springfield or Boston newspapers... only the Pittsfield paper, the Berkshire Eagle, carried a brief story about it. I wrote the author and thanked him. You might want to also. "Mercy in the Mud" I also wrote a letter to the Editor of the Union News in Springfield, asking them why they didn't bother covering Mercy Sunday, when it's in their own backyard... And funny, the Globe will follow Cardinal O'Malley all over the place if they are sniffing out bad news - but let him do something good, and they ignore it. Ah well.

God bless,
Lisa Alekna, MI