SPIRITUALITY OF MERCY

HARMONY WITH GOD: CALLED TO COMMUNION

Spirituality
• It is a direct relationship with God and can be
approached as the wholehearted living of the Christian
faith.
MERCY
• “Misericordia” in Latin
• It says: to have a heart (in Latin cor -
center of the human person ) for the
miseri, for those who are in misery.
• Not only passive emotional compassion
but acceptance of active responsibility for
the miserable.
Spirituality of MERCY

• Spirit-filled movement of the heart “to be merciful just as

God our Heavenly Father is merciful” (Lk 6:36).

• Arises from our own experience of God’s mercy.

 The Spirituality of Mercy lives both the
corporal and spiritual actions of mercy.

CORPORAL WORKS OF MERCY: SPIRITUAL WORKS OF MERCY:

• feed the hungry,
• give drink to the thirsty,
• clothe the naked,
• welcome the stranger,
• heal the sick,
• visit the imprisoned,
• bury the dead
• to counsel the doubtful,
• instruct the ignorant,
• admonish sinners,
• comfort the afflicted,
• forgive offences,
• bear patiently those who do us ill,
• pray for the living and the dead.
“Use the medicine of mercy” – P. John XXIII

The Church must therefore “proclaim the mercy of God, provide

people with God’s mercy and must allow God’s mercy to appear and
be realized in its entire life.”
Spirituality of Mercy on Environment

• The spirituality of mercy is faithful to God’s call

(holistic), it includes the natural world. It embraces
God’s creation—the environment and non-human
creatures.
Throw-away Culture

• A culture where everything is seen

as disposable, replaceable or
temporary.
• Strongly influenced
by consumerism.
• View of overconsumption and
excessive production of short-lived
or disposable items over durable
goods that can be repaired.
Throw-away Culture
• “We can look at figurative pathways strewn with broken relationships,
forgotten people, abandoned beliefs and dilapidated dreams”
Crisis of “Throw-away Culture”

• Practice of contraception and abortion

• Abandonment of the elderly and the handicapped

• Discarding of genuine relationships of married love

• Exclusion of the poor, exploitation of the weak,

• Wasting of our resources fueled by consumerism and

the market economy
Hedonism/Egoism/Narcissism

• When man is turned only to himself and seeks pleasure as the

“be all” and “end all” of life, avoids and shuns any form of
discipline and valuable sacrifice, throwaway attitude
develops.
Throw-away culture and
SOCIAL DEGRADATION (EG 53, LS 123, AL 39)

• economy of exclusion and inequality

• everything comes under the laws of
competition and the survival of the fittest
masses of people find themselves
excluded and marginalized: without work,
without possibilities, without any means
of escape.
Throw-away culture and
SOCIAL DEGRADATION (EG 53, LS 123, AL 39)

• Human beings are themselves considered consumer goods to be used and

then discarded.
• disorder which drives one person to take advantage of another, to treat
others as mere objects, imposing forced labor on them
Throw-away culture and
ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION
(LS 22)

• We have not yet managed to a circular model of production

capable of preserving resources for future generations
• We have not yet managed limit the use of non-renewable
resources, moderating their consumption, maximizing their
efficient use, reusing and recycling them.
Laudato Si’ (Praise be to you)

• On Care for our Common Home

• Everything is connected: when we
show no mercy to the
environment it is also showing no
mercy to our fellow human beings
especially the poor.
St. Thomas Aquinas on Mercy

• There is a poverty that goes beyond a lack of food and

clothing, to a lack of understanding, to darkness in the mind,
and confusion about how to live and find happiness.

• St. Thomas’ work of mercy is the spiritual work of instructing

the ignorant — as important and crucial as the corporal
works of mercy.
CONCLUSION:

• The corporal and spiritual works of mercy

continue in our own day to be proof of
mercy’s immense positive influence as a social
value.
• Mercy impels us to roll up our sleeves and set
about restoring dignity to millions of people;
they are our brothers and sisters who, with us,
are called to build a “city which is reliable”.