Year of Mercy: extraordinary opportunity to immerse ourselves into the love of God

Most Reverend Michael Mulvey is Bishop of the Diocese of Corpus Christi.

Twelve months ago, on Dec. 8, 2015, we—together with the entire Church—began an Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy. We have both celebrated and lived God's mercy. I hope that throughout this year, we have celebrated God's mercy through the profound experience of the Sacrament of Penance. 

I hope that many of you were able to journey to the Cathedral and walk through the Holy Door, or have taken advantage of visiting the holy doors at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, St. Joseph in Kingsville, St. Joseph in Beeville, St. Elizabeth in Alice and the Schoenstatt Chapel in Lamar. Those of you who have been incarcerated during the year had the opportunity to pass through your cell door to receive the mercy of God, and those of you who have been homebound or in a nursing facility had the opportunity to live the faith in joyful hope by attending Holy Mass or community prayer, even if only through the means of media, to receive the mercy of God. 

What an extraordinary opportunity each one of us has had to immerse ourselves into the immense love of God, into the immense depth of his mercy.

What have we learned about mercy during this year? I think it is fair to say that we have learned, first of all, that mercy is not something that I do; mercy flows from the very nature of God. Mercy is, by participation in his grace, what we are called to be. 

We have held before us the familiar—yet always profound—parable of the Prodigal Son and the Merciful Father. That parable will remain for us this year, and throughout our life as the sign of mercy. We are each called to live mercy and to “be merciful just as your Father is merciful (Lk 6:36)." As we conclude this year, I have for myself returned to the 13th Chapter of the First Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians to meditate upon St. Paul's great hymn of love. I think in many ways it can guide us to continue throughout our lives to glimpse into the very nature of God's mercy.

Love is patient. We could also say that patience is an expression of God's mercy toward us and ours toward our brothers and sisters. Mercy must begin with patience, patience with ourselves, patience with one another. 

Love is also kind. How many times our Holy Father in his past exhortations and the one for the Holy Year has spoken to us about the tenderness of God's love and that God's mercy toward us is kind and tender. So must ours be toward others. And so it goes, as St. Paul continues in his letter to the Corinthians. 

It seems that we could substitute the word mercy for love as he continues the hymn. Mercy is not arrogant or rude, mercy does not insist on its own way, mercy is not irritable or resentful, mercy does not rejoice at people's wrongs, mercy rejoices in what is good and right, mercy is able to bear all things, mercy is able to believe all things, hope all things, mercy can also endure all the trials and difficulties of life. As love never ends mercy is meant to never end. 

We all realize that this Year of Mercy ends, but mercy does not. Mercy is our permanent vocation as we journey through life. Although the Holy Doors of our own diocese will close soon, and the Holy Door in Rome will close on the Feast of Christ the King on Nov. 20, Jesus Christ is and will always be mercy. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Jesus is our vocation and he is Mercy. 

Our way of living mercy throughout this year has brought us to a deeper awareness and profound experience of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. These continue each day of our life.

 I want to thank the pastors and all pastoral ministers throughout the diocese who have embraced this year with enthusiasm and have promoted the message of mercy in their parishes and throughout the diocese.

Let us remember the unforgettable words of the Holy Father in the Bull of Indiction of the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy. The Holy Father wrote, "Jesus Christ is the face of the Father’s mercy. These words might well sum up the mystery of the Christian faith. Mercy has become living and visible in Jesus of Nazareth, reaching its culmination in him. The Father, 'rich in mercy' (Eph 2:4), after having revealed his name to Moses as 'a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness' (Ex 34:6), has never ceased to show, in various ways throughout history, his divine nature. In the 'fullness of time' (Gal 4:4), when everything had been arranged according to his plan of salvation, he sent his only Son into the world, born of the Virgin Mary, to reveal his love for us in a definitive way. Whoever sees Jesus sees the Father (cf. Jn 14:9). Jesus of Nazareth, by his words, his actions, and his entire person reveals the mercy of God (Misericordiae Vultus 1)."

Let us be transformed through God's grace into another Christ so that we too by our actions and our entire person will manifest the mercy of God.