- published: 01 Apr 2016
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Sunday (i/ˈsʌndeɪ/ or /ˈsʌndi/) is the day of the week between Saturday and Monday. For most Christians, Sunday is observed as a day for worship of God and rest, due to the belief that it is Lord's Day, the day of Christ's resurrection.
Sunday is a day of rest in most Western countries, part of 'the weekend'. In most Muslim countries, and Israel, Sunday is a working day.
According to the Hebrew calendars, traditional Christian calendars, Sunday is literally the "first day" of the week. According to the International Organization for Standardization ISO 8601 Sunday is the seventh and last day of the week.
No century in the Gregorian calendar starts on a Sunday, whether its first year is '00 or '01. The Jewish New Year never falls on a Sunday. (The rules of the Hebrew calendar are designed such that the first day of Rosh Hashanah will never occur on the first, fourth, or sixth day of the Jewish week; i.e., Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday).
The English noun Sunday derived sometime before 1250 from sunedai, which itself developed from Old English (before 700) Sunnandæg (literally meaning "sun's day"), which is cognate to other Germanic languages, including Old Frisian sunnandei, Old Saxon sunnundag, Middle Dutch sonnendach (modern Dutch zondag), Old High German sunnun tag (modern German Sonntag), and Old Norse sunnudagr (Danish and Norwegian søndag, Icelandic sunnudagur and Swedish söndag). The Germanic term is a Germanic interpretation of Latin dies solis ("day of the sun"), which is a translation of the Ancient Greek heméra helíou. The p-Celtic Welsh language also translates the Latin "day of the sun" as dydd Sul.
The Divine Mercy is a Roman Catholic devotion to the merciful love of God and the desire to let that love and mercy flow through one's own heart towards those in need of it. The devotion is due to Saint Mary Faustina Kowalska (1905-1938), who is known as the Apostle of Mercy.
Faustina Kowalska reported a number of visions of Jesus and conversations with him which she wrote in her diary, later published as the book Diary: Divine Mercy in My Soul. The three main themes of the devotion are to ask for and obtain the mercy of God, to trust in Christ's abundant mercy, and finally to show mercy to others and act as a conduit for God's mercy towards them.
The devotion places emphasis on the veneration of the Divine Mercy image which Faustina reported as a vision of Jesus while she was in her cell in the convent. The image is displayed and venerated by Catholics on its own, and is solemnly blessed during Divine Mercy Sunday. The devotion includes specific prayers such as the Chaplet of Divine Mercy.