ARTICLES

Deeds of Mercy

SHY WOMAN INVADES SAN FRANCISCO

By Eric Reslock

When one meets Thelma Orias, the thought that such a person could inspire thousands of people in San Francisco to new levels of reverence and devotion strains credulity. Expecting a type A personality, I was disarmed by Orias, who is 47 and small. Her warm greeting and serene disposition conceal her tenacity. Ten years ago, Orias set upon a spiritual journey to cure her sufferings and found such an abundance of inspiration that she has since set in motion an apostolate that has brought countless Bay Area Catholics into a closer communion with God.

Orias now bases the apostolate next door to St. John the Baptist Church in El Cerrito, where volunteers hold perpetual (7 days, 24 hours) Eucharistic adoration while following the Divine Mercy devotion. The work took nearly ten years, several conferences, events, and processions in San Francisco -- all organized by Thelma Orias. In 1989 general unhappiness convinced Orias that she needed to firm up her spiritual life. Her work in real estate and other businesses took up most of her time, but she decided she needed to carve out time for commitment to God. She began praying every day for weeks and developed, according to Orias, a desire for "a sincere surrender to God."

In February of 1990, a friend encouraged Orias to go to Eucharistic adoration at Our Lady of Peace in Santa Clara. Orias started to go at 2:30 a.m. "At the time, I didn't know anything about these kinds of devotions. I didn't know how to pray," Orias said. After attending adoration for a month, Orias began to feel the results. "I had no feeling at first. But then in March, I felt a need to ask for forgiveness. I confessed all my sins. Jesus came and taught me how to pray," Orias said. One day, she was moved to tell Jesus in prayer, "I want to serve you. Let me be your servant on Earth." She continued in her daily Eucharistic meditations until September of 1990 when she received some tapes in the mail from the Marian Helpers about the Divine Mercy devotion. After reviewing the material, "This," she decided, "is what God wants me to do."

On February 22, 1931, an uneducated Polish nun, Sister Faustina Kowalska, received a message that she was told to spread throughout the world. She was asked by the Lord to become the apostle and secretary of God's mercy, a model of how to be merciful to others, and an instrument for God's plan of mercy for the world. Sister Kowalska saw a vision of Jesus with rays of light streaming from His Heart. He told her to have an image painted to represent this vision and sign it, "Jesus, I trust in You!" After the initial vision, under the guidance of her spiritual director, Father Michale Sopocko, Sister Faustina wrote a diary of some 600 pages recording the revelations she was receiving about God's mercy. The writings of Blessed Faustina Kowalska are the source of the Divine Mercy devotion. The devotion to the divine mercy as revealed in the diary had begun to spread even before Sister Faustina's death in 1938, especially in Poland and Lithuania. Father Joseph Jarzebowski, a member of the Congregation of Marians of the Immaculate Conception, brought the devotion to the United States in 1941. With help from the Felician Sisters in Michigan and Connecticut, Father Jarzebowski spread the devotion from his base in Washington D.C., and in 1944 established the Mercy of God Apostolate on Eden Hill in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, now home of the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy. In 1958, the Church suddenly banned the devotion. According to the Mercy of God Apostolate, the ban was caused by the Holy See having come into possession of erroneous translations of Sister Faustina's diaries. During the ban, in obedience to Rome, the Marians limited the message of the Divine Mercy to that which reflected on Sacred Scripture, the Liturgy, the teachings of the Church, and Our Lady's revelations at Fatima.

Twenty years passed, and in 1978, the ban was lifted, thanks to the intervention of the Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Cardinal Wojtyla. An Informative Process was begun in 1965 to investigate the diary and devotions of Sister Faustina. This investigation led to Sister Faustina's beatification cause in 1968. On April 15, 1978, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, after reviewing documents not previously available, reversed its decision from 1958 and declared the prohibition "non-binding." Six months later, Karol Cardinal Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II. On March 7, 1992, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints promulgated the Decree of Heroic Virtues, by which the Church acknowledges that Sister Faustina practiced all the Christian virtues to a heroic degree. In that same year, a healing at the tomb of Sister Faustina was recognized as a miracle by three separate panels appointed by the Sacred Congregation. On December 21, 1992, the Holy Father published the Church's acceptance of the miracle as granted through the intercession of Sister Faustina. He announced that her solemn beatification would take place in Rome on April 18, 1993, the Sunday following Easter, which Our Lord revealed to Blessed Faustina as the Feast of Mercy.

While Catholics need not accept the revelations to Blessed Faustina Kowalska as a matter of faith the way the Apostle's Creed must be accepted, the revelations have served to enhance the fervor and devotion of many Catholics around the world. The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, presented at the Second Vatican Council, teaches that popular devotions of the Christian people are warmly commended as long as they are in accord with the laws and norms of the Church. The Divine Mercy devotions seek to radiate God's mercy to others. The diaries of Blessed Faustina state, "I demand from you deeds of mercy which are to arise out of love for me. You are to show mercy to your neighbors always and everywhere. You must not shrink from this or try to excuse yourself from it." According to the diaries, the way to radiate the divine mercy is threefold: By our actions, our words, and our prayers. "In these degrees," Jesus told Sister Faustina, "is contained the fullness of mercy." These requirements are a restatement of what the Church calls the spiritual and corporal works of mercy, a list of 14 ways to engage and respond to the physical and spiritual needs of others.

Thelma Orias is not, by admission, sociable. Before beginning her spiritual conversion, she had not joined any groups or clubs. In September of 1990, she began approaching priests in churches in the Bay Area to spread the devotion. She donated a picture to the sacristy at St. Joseph Church on Howard Street in San Francisco. In March 1991, Monsignor Fred Bitanga from St. Joseph's called Orias to enquire about the picture. From that discussion, Bitanga enthroned the Divine Mercy image in the church to honor the feast of the Divine Mercy. When St. Joseph's closed, the devotion was moved to St. Patrick's in the Mission district in San Francisco, where the feast has been part of their Easter celebrations ever since. St. Boniface Church on Golden Gate Avenue went on to enthrone the image of the Divine Mercy on February 1995.

Orias decided to organize a conference to promote the Divine Mercy devotion. The first event was called, "The First Divine Mercy Peace & Healing Convention," which took place on February 19, 1994 at St. Mary's Cathedral Hall in San Francisco. 1,200 Catholics showed up. She found encouragement from the Catholic community. Bishop Quinn wrote at the time, "I pray that the Lord of all mercy will grant His riches and most abundant blessings to all of those who will be attending the convention." In her keynote address, Orias expressed thanks for her inspiration. "First of all, I praise and thank our Father in heaven and our Lord Jesus Christ for the gift of trust, which they have given me...."

The next part of Orias' address was an appeal to the attendees of the conference, which Orias says, sprang out of her conversations with Our Lord while meditating before the Eucharist. "My simple advice is not to be anxious in serving God. Do not plan; instead, be a receiver of God's grace. Wait for Him to open the gate of His vineyard before you enter, so that your work will bear good fruit. Please remember that we cannot do anything without Him...."

The encouragement she received led Orias to organize more events. For the first time in 30 years, on November 25, 1994, San Francisco Catholics participated in a major religious procession in the city. Orias led between 400 and 500 people from St. Patrick's Church down to 3rd Street and up Market Street in honor of the Divine Mercy. Later, in November of 1996, Orias produced a Gospel concert in San Francisco. Two weeks before the concert, on November 1st, the feast of All Saints, Father Louis Vitale, pastor of St. Boniface Church in San Francisco wrote in a letter to the parish, "Surely she (Orias) is moved by God in her zeal for the Church. We are grateful to all the promoters of the Divine Mercy and all others who have worked so hard." Orias then went on to organize the National Divine Mercy conference on March 9, 1997 at the Oakland Convention Center. The event was called, "A Family Encounter With the Divine Mercy." The conference filled the convention center to capacity. In the spring of 1997, Orias found a storage area with several rooms next door to St. John the Baptist Church in El Cerrito that was available for rent. For six months, Orias prayed for guidance on how she could come up with $1500 a month needed to rent the rooms. Orias said that in October of 1997, six months after praying for assistance, "I felt the Blessed Mother in my side. I heard her in my heart, not in my ear. She [the Blessed Mother] said, 'Don't worry, I'll take care of that. I am your co-worker.'" Orias rented the rooms in El Cerrito and set up a chapel with a tabernacle to hold a consecrated host, and a large picture of the Image of the Divine Mercy. Her prayers were answered with donations, some of them anonymous, sufficient to keep the chapel open. On April 19, 1998, on the feast of the Divine Mercy, the blessing and inauguration of the West Coast Divine Mercy Center was held at the chapel in El Cerrito, where perpetual adoration now takes place.

On the Second Sunday of Easter, April 23, 1995, Pope John Paul II celebrated Divine Mercy Sunday and enthroned a Divine Mercy Image at the Divine Mercy Center established for the diocese of Rome in the Church of the Holy Spirit in Sassia. In his homily, the Pope challenged everyone to "trust in the Lord and be apostles of Divine Mercy." After she has ensured the viability of the chapel in El Cerrito, Orias plans to start a new apostolate that will serve the Bay Area with the practice and spreading of the corporal works of mercy.