Fr. Chris Alar presents mission in Park City

IC photo/Marie Mischel

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Father Chris Alar, MIC presents a talk on the meaning of the Mass and the message of Divine Mercy at St. Mary of the Assumption Catholic Church on Feb. 16.

PARK CITY — Father Chris Alar, MIC gave a three-night mission at St. Mary of the Assumption Parish. His topics for the Feb. 16-18 mission included the meaning of Mass, the message Divine Mercy, and Suicide and God’s Divine Mercy.

The message of the Divine Mercy was a private revelation given to Saint Faustina Kowalska in 1931. The saint wrote a diary about the visits she received from the risen Christ. His message was for people to ask for his mercy, to be merciful and to trust completely in him.

Fr. Alar, a priest with the Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, is the author of After Suicide: There’s Hope for Them and for You. He also wrote and produced the “Divine Mercy 101” DVD and is a host on EWTN as well as the online “Divine Mercy Matters” series at DivineMercyMatters.org. In addition he is director of the Association of Marian Helpers, and is the head of Marian Press.

During his visit, Fr. Alar also celebrated the weekend Masses. “If you’re hurting in any way, the mission here is to bring God’s message and mercy,” he said during his homily for the Sunday evening Mass.

“God brought you here [to the presentation] for a purpose,” Fr. Alar said as he opened his talk.

“This is an opportunity for all of us to hear and live and go out these doors to be a part of God’s mercy, which is the solution to the world’s problems. As I said in the homilies, Jesus made it very clear to  St. Faustina [that] Divine Mercy is mankind’s last hope of salvation.”

The best one word to describe God is love, Fr. Alar said, because love is the greatest virtue, and the highest level of love is mercy.

“Mercy is a particular mode of love that, when love encounters suffering – which we all are – it does something. It takes action,” he said.

“God wants to do something about this suffering,” he said, by loving and forgiving each person.

“This is divine mercy,” he said.

The Mass is an antidote to suffering, he said, “because the sacraments are penicillin.”

“The Mass is your worship, not your entertainment,” he added.

The message of Divine Mercy is important, said Linda Lukanowski, a St. Mary of the Assumption parishioner who had an experience with the Divine Mercy that “was such a great gift and such an enormous gift that I knew it wasn’t meant just for me, so I’m doing whatever I can  to help spread it.”

Lukanowski worked with Deacon Greg Werking to arrange for Fr. Alar to give the mission.

“We are just trying to get the message of Divine Mercy, not just within our own parishes but to the whole diocese,” she said.