Santa Faustina Kowalska

Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska was born Helena Kowalska on August 25, 1905, in the small village of Głogowiec, Poland, into a poor but devout family. From childhood she sensed a call to belong wholly to Christ, yet she spent her teenage years working as a housekeeper to help support her parents. After a striking encounter with the suffering Jesus while at a dance in Łódź, she obeyed an interior summons to leave for Warsaw and seek religious life. In 1926 she entered the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy and received the name Maria Faustina of the Blessed Sacrament. Assigned to houses in Płock, Vilnius, and elsewhere, she lived humbly in ordinary duties while receiving extraordinary graces. In Płock, she saw Jesus with rays of mercy streaming from His Heart and was asked to spread trust in His mercy, including the image inscribed, “Jesus, I trust in You.” With the help of her confessor, Father Michał Sopoćko, the first Divine Mercy image was painted and publicly honored. Called the Apostle and “secretary” of Divine Mercy, she died in Kraków on October 5, 1938. Her feast day is October 5.