The Holy Face of Jesus

The Face inspires peace and adoration and invites to conversion.He who sees it shall not want to sin; he who sees it inspired shall be

This is an oil painted copy of the first image of Merciful Jesus (1934) painted upon the order given by Jesus to Sister Faustina.

This Image was painted in the year 2010 in Mexico City; it was inspired on the face described by the enlightened Sister Faustina Kowalska and painted by Eugene Kazimirowski in Vilnus, Lithuania in 1934

The image of the Divine Mercy was painted on orders given by Jesus Himself on February 22th, 1931 in Plock (Poland). In the evening, - sister Faustina writes- when I was in my cell, I saw the Lord Jesus clothed in a white garment. One hand was raised in the gesture of blessing; the other was touching the garment at the breast. From beneath the garment, slightly drawn aside at the breast, there were emanating two large rays, one red, and the other pale. (…) After a while, Jesus said to me,” Paint an image according to the pattern you see, with the signature: Jesus, I trust in You. I desire that this image be venerated, first in your chapel, and then throughout the world”.

The first Image of Merciful Jesus, painted by Eugene Kazimirowski (1934), was approved by Jesus Himself. Sister Faustina was concerned that the nuns in the convent did not believe that it was really the work of God and not her work and she asked Jesus how she could convince them. Jesus told her: “By means of the graces I will grant through this image, they shall know it is my work”

The Polish nun was chosen by Jesus to spread the message of His Mercy to the world. She was canonized by Blessed John Paul II on April 30th, 2000.

The Image painted in Mexico City was performed by Susana Segura, after a very providential trip she made in 2009 and where she received the inspiration to paint it.

Susana Segura was born on October 5th, 1960, the day of Saint Faustina. She is an Apostle of the Divine Mercy since 2005. She is dedicated to spread the devotion of the Divine Mercy and promote the message of Jesus. Among her activities she visits hospitals in the western part of Mexico City three times a week.

In 2009, when she had the opportunity to travel to Europe, she had a desire to visit the place where the image of Merciful Jesus is. For the last 4 years, in her apostolate, she had spread the devotion to this image. She was eager to see it up close. She got in touch with a Friend she had in Poland to get the address, but she told her that she didn’t know where the Image of Merciful Jesus that was directed by St. Faustina and painted in 1934 by Eugene Kazimirowski was, however she suggested that she should see the painting of Merciful Jesus painted by Adolfo Hyla (1944) venerated in Krakow Lagiewniki in the Shrine of the Divine Mercy, Susana replied, "I will go there too," but her greatest wish was to go see the first Image.

That same week, two months before her trip, Susana visited the sick in the hospital, and she went into the room of a small two year old and she was very surprised when she saw a poster of the first image of Merciful Jesus on the wall behind the bed. It is not common for someone to have that Image, the best known is the one in the Sanctuary of Krakow, painted by Adolf Hyla. She asked where the Image had come from and she was told that it came from Lithuania. The night before Father Igor Simonovis, founder of the Congregation of the Brothers of Merciful Jesus (2005) in Vilnius, Lithuania, had been there (the tumor near the heart of the boy had disappeared). Susana asked for the whereabouts of the Father. He was going to be in Mexico for a few more days. She saw him and told him about her desire to visit the first Image and, to her surprise, he replied that it was in his Diocese, that they were guarding it and that if she went to Lithuania, he would pick her up at the airport and he would take her to all the places connected with the Divine Mercy. So it was. It is worth mentioning that the day she saw Father Igor, there were several rooms unvisited, sometimes there are too many rooms and very little time to visit them all, Susana says that, without her knowing it, she visited the right room.

Her visit to Vilnius was wonderful; she visited every single place related with the Divine Mercy, and received exceptional treatment.

When she was in the chapel of the convent, that was formerly the workshop of Eugene Kazimirowski, where he painted the first image of Merciful Jesus (1934), she asked Jesus for blessings for her Apostolate ...When she boarded the plane back to Mexico, a desire to paint Jesus emerged; she started doing some sketches of the Face on a napkin and realized that they were not bad at all.She had always loved to paint, especially faces. At the age of 15 she took art classes for two years. She painted something later in life, but really very little, her favorite technique was pastel, she had only painted 2 or 3 pictures with oil paint. But when she decided to paint the Image of Jesus she had not touched a brush for over 15 years.

She only had time to paint on Saturdays, she tried many times to get that merciful look watching from the cross (because this is what Jesus told Saint Faustina), she could not get that image, so she painted it an erased it over and over, again and again, she invested many hours until she gave up and decided not to continue because she couldn’t express what she wanted. She thought it was too ambitious to try to paint the face of Jesus and transmit his love and peace ... so she left the painting leaning against a wall of her small studio with the image facing the wall, she did not want to continue working on it (she felt frustrated, deep in her heart her wish was to have finished it).

Two months later, during a trip she took at the end of the year to North America, she was involved in a major car accident, the front of her car was completely destroyed, the people who witnessed the accident thought she was dead. But nothing happened to her, she was praying the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy. At the moment of the impact all the airbags were activated, all were white and that's why she says that the only thing she saw

was white all around and then somehow God told her that He wanted her to continue working for Him. She mentions that she thought she had heard a voice, not coming from the outside, but from very deep in her heart that said: "I'm giving you more time because you still have so much to do here on earth" without understanding she accelerated and not knowing how, because the front tires were all twisted, she managed to get off the road and park in a small side street.

When she returned to Mexico, Susana Segura decided to continue with the painting of Jesus, she thought He was giving her another opportunity to live and to continue working for him in the Apostolate and this image would form an important part of it.

She started praying more, spent many, many hours before the Blessed Sacrament in the Eucharistic Adoration and asked Jesus to guide the strokes of her brush. She told Jesus: You comforted Saint Faustina, when she cried uncontrollably because the face of the Image that You ordered her to paint, and was painted by Eugenio Kazimirowski, described by her, did not transmit what she had seen in you, You told her it did not matter,“Not in the beauty of the color, nor of the brush lies the greatness of this image, but in My grace”. (Diary 313)

Saint Faustina then calmed down and was satisfied, but I’m telling you that You also know that it is through our senses that we can feel, so please help me, even a little, so that I can capture and transmit Your love, Your peace, Your goodness, Your tenderness, Your mercy, in order to captivate people and conquer souls for You. Susana Segura finished painting the Image on February 26th 2010.

The picture captures the Face of Jesus Christ which transmits the peace and love of God, this image received the solemn blessing on April 11th, 2010 (Feast of Divine Mercy), in the old Basilica of Guadalupe, the same way Jesus had asked Saint Faustina . “The image, which you will paint with a brush, shall be solemnly blessed on the first Sunday after Easter; That Sunday is to be the Feast of Mercy. ” (Diary 49). For a whole year the image was moving around to different churches, parishes and events.

Since May 27th, 2011, the Image is worshiped publicly and permanently in the altar of the Parish of the Mother of God of Czestochowa in Mexico. Fuente de Cibeles street # 38 and Fuente de Trevi street. Lomas de Tecamachalco, Naucalpan. State of Mexico. In the same Parish, at the feet of the Image of Jesus, the first degree relic of St. Faustina kowalska granted in Poland is worshiped.

Susana made a second trip to Poland-Krakow in the year 2011 to attend the second World Congress of the Divine Mercy. She received then the relic of Saint Faustina on October 5th, to be venerated before the Image she painted, she visited then the city of Plock, she went to the convent where Jesus appeared to Sister Faustina for the first time asking her to paint the image.

One of the sisters, who talked about the life of Saint Faustina, had her diary in Spanish (an exceptional Document where the conversations between Jesus and Saint Faustina are written by herself on the order of his spiritual leader Blessed M. Sopoćko and Jesus Himself), suddenly she chose Susana, among 20 people who were in the group, to read paragraphs # 47, 48, 49 of the diary: and to her great surprise they were about the time when Jesus asked Sister Faustina to paint the image: “The image, which you will paint with a brush, shall be solemnly blessed on the first Sunday after Easter; That Sunday is to be the Feast of Mercy. ” To her this meant that Jesus reconfirmed that His Image was not her work but the work of Jesus

In May 2013, a little over 3 years after painting the Image, Susana met Father Igor again. He was visiting Mexico City for a few days (she had lost contact with him for 2 years), while Father Igor was in Mexico, he had a desire to get confession, so he went to the Parish of Czestochowa, unaware that the image was there. Susana was at the Parish that same day at the same time. When Father Igor entered they recognized each other and headed toward the Image. Susana showed it to him. He was shocked and surprised. He approached the image and liked it very much. Then he came closer to see it better and he kissed the Heart of Jesus. When Susana saw him so close to Jesus and how he looked at Him with so much love, she could not have been happier (the Father said that being so close He looked different, He looked as if He were alive), Susana mentioned that she felt that perhaps he was getting an extraordinary grace. She had a camera in her hands and took "the picture" at the very moment of the kiss. When the Father left, he gave her his blessing and said: I received a special grace. Father Igor Simonovis, without knowing, was the means through which for the Image was painted.

There have been many reproductions of the Image of Merciful Jesus painted in Mexico City by Susana Segura and they are worshiped in different churches of the country and Mexico City, among them the Chapel of the hill of Tepeyac in Basilica of Guadalupe.

They have also been placed in other countries to be worshiped.Other reproductions are being made in USA: http://holyartworks.com/

Great favors inexplicable cures and conversions have been received through this image.“By means of this Image I shall be granting many graces to souls; so let every soul have access to it”.

If you wish to acquire the images, please contact us through: sdm.sso@gmail.com

http://www.jesusdivinamisericordia.org.mx/

Luz Elena Cecilia Hemken A.