Feasts
In her very first vision of Jesus, Sister Faustina heard him say: “I desire that the first Sunday after Easter be the Feast of Mercy.” As requested by the Saviour, the Merciful Jesus painting was blessed on this day. In the year 2000, the Congregation for Divine Worship established that the first Sunday after Easter would be celebrated by the universal Church as the solemn Feast of Divine Mercy.
Between Easter Sunday and the Divine Mercy Feast, the shrine organizes Mercy Week, during which talks, lectures, concerts and exhibitions ripple through the courtyards of the Vilnius Old Town. On the evening of Easter Monday, the impressive Path of Light is held: a procession with candles from the Gate of Dawn to the Divine Mercy Shrine, led by the Vilnius Archbishop. Clergy from non-Catholic Christian confessions also join the procession, which stops briefly at the Orthodox Church and Monastery of the Holy Spirit, at the Eastern-rite Catholic Basilian Monastery and at the Evangelical Lutheran Church. After the procession, and after evening events every day of the week, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament takes place at the Divine Mercy Shrine all night and until Mass at midday.
