Have other Popes promoted the Divine Mercy?

Have other Popes promoted the Divine Mercy?

While Pope St. John Paul II can rightly be called the Pope of Mercy, Pope Benedict XVI, who served as his doctrinal prefect, spoke especially about the Divine Mercy in its ministerial aspect, saying on the Feast of Divine Mercy in 2008,

[M]ercy is the central nucleus of the Gospel message; it is the very name of God, the Face with which he revealed himself in the Old Covenant and fully in Jesus Christ, the incarnation of creative and redemptive Love. May this merciful love also shine on the face of the Church and show itself through the sacraments, in particular that of Reconciliation, and in works of charity, both communitarian and individual. May all that the Church says and does manifest the mercy God feels for man, and therefore for us. When the Church has to recall an unrecognized truth or a betrayed good, she always does so impelled by merciful love, so that men and women may have life and have it abundantly (cf. Jn 10:10). From divine mercy, which brings peace to hearts, genuine peace flows into the world, peace between different peoples, cultures and religions.

Pope Francis has likewise shown great concern to bring God’s mercy to the sinner, and humanly to the marginalized. Early in his pontificate he called an Extraordinary Jubilee of Divine Mercy, designated priests as “Missionaries of Mercy” with special faculties to reconcile certain classes of penitents and established simpler norms for the handling of difficult marriage cases. He has also frequently advocated for those “on the peripheries” of human society, whether the poor or migrants. On Divine Mercy Sunday in the Jubilee Year he drew attention to the healing aspects of the Divine Mercy, especially as it comes to others through us, saying,

In God’s mercy, all of our infirmities find healing. His mercy, in fact, does not keep a distance: it seeks to encounter all forms of poverty and to free this world of so many types of slavery. Mercy desires to reach the wounds of all, to heal them. Being apostles of mercy means touching and soothing the wounds that today afflict the bodies and souls of many of our brothers and sisters. Curing these wounds, we profess Jesus, we make him present and alive; we allow others, who touch his mercy with their own hands, to recognize him as “Lord and God” (Jn 20:28), as did the Apostle Thomas. This is the mission that he entrusts to us.