How to Pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet

The Divine Mercy Chaplet is a short Catholic prayer of intercession, prayed on ordinary rosary beads, that asks God's mercy "on us and on the whole world." It came to the Church through St Faustina Kowalska, a Polish nun who died in 1938, and it is now prayed in parishes, hospitals and homes on every continent.

This post gives every prayer of the Chaplet in order, in the standard English wording used by the Marians of the Immaculate Conception, who promote the devotion worldwide. It then explains what the words mean, where the prayer comes from, when Catholics pray it, and how much weight the Church gives to the revelations behind it.

What is the Divine Mercy Chaplet?

The Divine Mercy Chaplet is a set prayer, prayed on a five-decade rosary, in which the person praying offers Christ's Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity to God the Father and asks mercy for the whole world. It takes about seven minutes and needs nothing but beads, or fingers.

A "chaplet" is simply a prayer said on beads. Unlike the Rosary, it is not a meditation on a sequence of scenes. It is one act of intercession repeated fifty times: a single request, held steadily in front of God.

That makes it a prayer of the kind the Catechism describes as intercession, "asking on behalf of another," which it calls "characteristic of a heart attuned to God's mercy" (CCC 2635). The Chaplet asks for mercy on "us," but it never stops at us. Every decade widens to "the whole world."

How do you pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, step by step?

Begin with the Sign of the Cross and, optionally, two short opening prayers. Pray one Our Father, one Hail Mary and the Apostles' Creed. Then pray five decades: the "Eternal Father" on each large bead, "For the sake of His sorrowful Passion" on each small bead. Close with "Holy God" three times.

1. Make the Sign of the Cross. "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."

2. Optional opening prayer. "You expired, Jesus, but the source of life gushed forth for souls, and the ocean of mercy opened up for the whole world. O Fount of Life, unfathomable Divine Mercy, envelop the whole world and empty Yourself out upon us."

3. Optional: repeat three times. "O Blood and Water, which gushed forth from the Heart of Jesus as a fount of mercy for us, I trust in You." The image comes from the Gospel of John, where a soldier pierces Jesus' side "and immediately blood and water flowed out" (John 19:34).

4. On the first bead after the crucifix, pray an Our Father. "Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen."

5. On the next bead, pray a Hail Mary. "Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen."

6. On the next bead, pray the Apostles' Creed. "I believe in God, the Father almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried; he descended into hell; on the third day he rose again from the dead; he ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty; from there he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen."

7. On each large bead, pray the Eternal Father. "Eternal Father, I offer You the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your dearly beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world."

8. On each of the ten small beads, pray: "For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world."

9. Repeat for all five decades. One Eternal Father, ten invocations, five times over. There is no Glory Be between decades.

10. Conclude by praying three times: "Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world."

11. Optional closing prayer. "Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy itself." Then make the Sign of the Cross.

What do the words of the Chaplet mean?

The Chaplet is a Eucharistic prayer said outside of Mass. In the Eternal Father, the person praying offers the Father the same Christ who is present in the Eucharist, and asks that this one sacrifice be applied to the whole world. The small-bead invocation names the reason mercy is asked: Christ's Passion.

The phrase "Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity" is not devotional ornament. It is the Church's own description of the Real Presence: in the Eucharist "the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained" (CCC 1374). If you have read our explainer on what the Eucharist is, the Chaplet will sound familiar.

A lay person offering Christ to the Father can sound presumptuous. It is not a second sacrifice. The Catechism teaches that "the sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice" (CCC 1367). The Chaplet adds nothing to that sacrifice. It asks, in the words of a baptised believer, that its effects reach further.

"In atonement for our sins and those of the whole world" places the pray-er among the sinners, not above them. The Catechism puts the whole of the Gospel in one sentence: it "is the revelation in Jesus Christ of God's mercy to sinners" (CCC 1846). The Chaplet is that sentence turned into a request.

The closing "Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One" is an ancient hymn known as the Trisagion, "thrice holy." It is also sung in the Roman Rite's Good Friday liturgy. Its place at the end of the Chaplet ties this modern devotion to one of the oldest prayers of the Church.

Where does the Divine Mercy Chaplet come from?

The Chaplet comes from the diary of St Faustina Kowalska, a Polish sister of Our Lady of Mercy. In 1935 she recorded hearing the words of the Eternal Father interiorly while praying for mercy, and the next day the instruction on how to pray them on beads (Diary 475–476).

Faustina died in 1938. Her diary, written at the request of her confessor, records a series of revelations centred on God's mercy: the image of the merciful Jesus with the words "Jesus, I trust in You," a feast of mercy on the Sunday after Easter, the hour of Christ's death as an "hour of mercy," and the Chaplet itself.

According to the Diary, the Chaplet was first given for a specific crisis: Faustina saw an angel sent to punish a city, and the prayer she heard interiorly held back the punishment (Diary 474–475). Later entries extend it to everyone, with particular promises attached to praying it for the dying (Diary 687, 1541).

Pope John Paul II, himself Polish, canonised her on 30 April 2000. In his canonisation homily he declared that the Second Sunday of Easter "from now on throughout the Church will be called 'Divine Mercy Sunday'," and spoke of how many souls had been consoled by the prayer "Jesus, I trust in you."

When should you pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet?

Any time. Three moments are traditional: three o'clock in the afternoon, the hour of Christ's death; the nine days from Good Friday to Divine Mercy Sunday, as a novena; and at the bedside of someone who is dying. Many people also pray it after receiving Communion.

The three o'clock hour follows the Gospels. Mark records that "at three o'clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice" shortly before he died (Mark 15:34). The habit is similar to the Angelus, which marks morning, noon and evening: a fixed hour that pulls a busy day back to prayer for a few minutes.

The novena begins on Good Friday and ends on the Second Sunday of Easter. In 2002 the Apostolic Penitentiary attached a plenary indulgence to Divine Mercy Sunday under the usual conditions of sacramental confession, Eucharistic communion and prayer for the Pope's intentions, for those who take part in the prayers and devotions held in honour of Divine Mercy (Decree of the Apostolic Penitentiary, 2002).

The same decree points to the Sunday's Gospel, in which the risen Christ breathes on the apostles and gives them power to forgive sins. That is not a coincidence. Divine Mercy and the confessional belong together, and if the Chaplet has you thinking about going back to confession after years away, it is doing what it was meant to do. A short Act of Contrition fits naturally after the final Holy God.

How is the Divine Mercy Chaplet different from the Rosary?

The Chaplet uses the same beads as the Rosary but a different prayer. The Rosary is a Marian meditation on twenty mysteries of Christ's life, taking about twenty minutes. The Chaplet is a direct appeal to the Father for mercy through the Passion, taking about seven minutes. Neither replaces the other.

In the Rosary, the repeated Hail Mary is a frame for meditation: the mind rests on a mystery while the lips keep time. In the Chaplet, the repeated words are the content. "Have mercy on us and on the whole world" is not background. It is the whole request, said fifty times because the need does not go away after the first.

Practically, the differences are small. Large beads carry the Eternal Father instead of the Our Father. Small beads carry the invocation instead of the Hail Mary. There are no mysteries to announce, no Glory Be, and no Hail Holy Queen.

Do Catholics have to believe in St Faustina's revelations?

No. Faustina's revelations are private revelation. The Church has recognised them as consistent with the faith and canonised the woman who received them, but they are not part of the deposit of faith, and no Catholic is obliged to believe them. The Chaplet's content, however, is ordinary Catholic doctrine.

The Catechism is precise about this category. Private revelations "do not belong, however, to the deposit of faith. It is not their role to improve or complete Christ's definitive Revelation, but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history" (CCC 67).

That is why the Chaplet can be recommended without reservation even to someone sceptical of visions. Strip away the story of its origin and what remains is the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Creed, an offering of Christ's sacrifice to the Father, a plea based on the Passion, and a hymn from the ancient liturgy. None of that depends on Faustina. All of it depends on the Gospel.

The Diary's promises attached to the Chaplet belong to the private-revelation side of the ledger. They encourage trust; they do not bind God. The Diary itself puts the condition plainly: what is asked must be "compatible with My will" (Diary 1731).

The Chaplet is short on purpose. It fits into seven minutes, needs no book once memorised, and asks for one thing: mercy, for everyone.