It is our sin that makes mercy necessary; mercy being love in the face of need.
And it is our sin - not the sin of our past, but the sin of our NOW - that makes God's mercy and love so incredible, incomprehensible. These things that we see in ourselves that make us unlovable and unworthy are the very things that allow God to show His mercy and love as our only hope, far beyond our capacity to grasp.

He always looks on us with mercy. His glance tears down the wall that keeps us apart from our selves and from Him, and leaves us open and vulnerable to change. His hands reach in through the cleft of our being and straighten the convolutions of our minds, calms our hearts, strengthens every fiber within. And His Word is always action and peace, coming from the mouth of Love and penetrating to the center of what we are, renewing us. His creative power is perpetually making all things new. Truth is dynamic and embraces every age and each person’s situation – He is alive and breathing through His Church and through each soul, revealing Himself ever anew.

Love is always new, love always finds new ways to give itself, to prove itself, to express itself. There is nothing sclerotic about Truth, because God is Truth, and He is “ever ancient, ever new.”

This giving that began before time and reached its summit when the King of kings was crowned with thorns and raised on the throne of the cross continues to give at every moment, to give through our hands and words. Every moment is an intersection of time with the eternal, in which the Incarnation and Passion of Christ are being made present in every life and circumstance. The Kingdom of God is within us, with its power to save each of us.

We are saved by His love and mercy.

~from His Suffering and Ours, available from http://www.lulu.com/kathryntherese