Over 23 years ago as I was finishing seminary and about to be ordained my spiritual director gave me some advice on seeking a new spiritual director in my diocese. “Look for some one who has suffered,” He said. At the time I wondered about this but have come to find that it was true.
Suffering brings a profound wisdom if it is endured with faith. I have also discovered this in my own life. As much as I have hated any suffering I have endured I have to admit it has brought gifts in strange packages. Through it I discovered gifts and strengths I did not know I had. Through it I experienced things I would have avoided. Through I learned to seek help and not depend so much on myself. Through it I became better equipped to help others in their struggles. Through suffering my faith grew and so did my compassion and generosity for others who have struggled.
The scriptures say that “A broken humbled heart the Lord will not scorn” (Ps 51). A few years ago my spiritual director shared a strange saying with me: Everything needs a crack in it, that’s how the light gets in.” Yes indeed, the light gets in through a broken heart, a heart with fissures or openings. Rarely does the light get in through a perfect wall, a perfect and strong barrier.
This is a painful truth to be sure and it makes me want to run. But in the end I have learned that it is true. God has done more with my brokenness than my strength. And, in a paradoxical way, my brokenness has become more and more my strength. I wonder if you have experienced the same? Where would we be without our crosses and sufferings? What do we have of true value that has not come at the price of suffering?
Let me get out the way and let a Saint explain it. This is from St. Rose of Lima whose feast we celebrated recently. This is an excerpt of what was in the breviary:
Our Lord and Saviour lifted up his voice and said with incomparable majesty: “Let all men know that grace comes after tribulation. Let them know that without the burden of afflictions it is impossible to reach the height of grace. Let them know that the gifts of grace increase as the struggles increase. Let men take care not to stray and be deceived. This is the only true stairway to paradise, and without the cross they can find no road to climb to heaven.”
God loves us perfectly, purely and infinitely and wants to give all that a Father can possible give His beloved children but, we are impure. He can do it anyway but knows that we cannot become one with these graces. He designed us to grow. His time is a watch in the night to a thousand years (Psalm 90:4) and He purifies us in a timely manner.
Like the ore ripped from the depths of hte ground; then milled and crushed; fired to change states in the frunace of the smelter; slag floated out and skimmed away like scales removed from our eyes.
After the raging blast of the smelter the sudden cooling into ingots then the fury of the forge; the hammer the anvil. Spare the metal from the hammer; spare it from the reheating and the tempering; the sudden crunching of rapid cooling; the stretching of the crystals to make them strong; the alloys; challenges offered; spare any of this and spoil the end result – deprive us.
Afterward, the fulfillment. The joy that combines with the suffering to make a greater whole; the purification that only God could offer; looking up and fearing that about Him which we can’t ever hope to understand; fearing it in a good and motivating way rather than a de-motivating fear that makes us look horizontally to one another in a futile search for His perfections as the sparing of the rod of suffering spoils the children.
No, we look up to what is right and true because, if we look to each other we fear not being believed and we’d rather be believed than be right if left to our own devices. But He is right and we need not worry because He prepares us for the manna, the water from the rock, for proper reception of the graces.
Upon proofreading I ask myself. Do I judge God? Do I dare to declare such extreme knowledge is mine to impart? Then, I realize … I don’t know it … I feel it.
Beautiful post, Monsignor.
It’s appropriate that this was posted on August 28. Among the great saints whose feast we celebrate today [not forgetting Saint Augustine] is Saint Moses the Ethiopian, one of “the Desert Fathers” of the fourth and fifth centuries. There are at least two aspects of Saint Moses’ story that give us examples of suffering that we can draw strength from:
1) Saint Moses had been a bandit before he became a Christian and joined a monastery in the North African desert. He found it difficult to leave his former life behind and he even considered leaving the monastery because he felt that he was unworthy to be a proper Christian monk. This undoubtedly caused him great personal suffering. Who among us has felt that we just aren’t good enough to follow Christ?
2) Around 405, the monastery was attacked by organized bandits. Saint Moses, who was then a septuagenarian and one of the leaders of the monastery, forebade the monks from taking up arms against the attackers. Instead, he and several of the other monks greeted the bandits with open arms and were martyred. Saint Moses’ story says that he was actually having doubts as to whether the monks should defend themselves or not. Despite these doubts, he persevered in following the non-violent course. At the point of martyrdom, he said to his brother monk, named Zechariah: “Rejoice and be glad, O my son Zechariah, for the gates of heaven have been opened”.
It is hard not to be deeply moved by the stories of the martyrs. Their powerful example of redemption through suffering should give strength to us all.
The Cross confounds the wicked, but to us it is glory.
That’s why the Antichrist will be permitted to come.
I think tribulation shouldn’t be confused with sorrow and as much as possible we should shun the sorrow that can come with tribulation. My reason for saying this isn’t myself, but St. Francis de Sales. He gives two spiritual benefits that come with sorrow: compassion and repentance. He gives six evil effects that come with sorrow: anxiety, sloth, wrath, jealousy, envy, and impatience. See the Introduction to the Devout Life by St. Francis de Sales, the fourth part, chapter 12, for more information on how to deal with sorrow.
Great Post Msgr. Pope
” Someone once remarked that pain is the touchstone of spiritual progress. How heartily we A.A.’s can agree with him, for we know that the pains of alcoholism had to come before sobriety, and emotional turmoil before serenity…”
Bill W. p. 93-94 12 & 12 Alcoholics Anonymous
Understanding suffering through experience humbled me and led me back to God, to the church and taught me gratitude.
I am grateful for your thoughtful teaching & the commentary.
I am certain that Jesus has been calling me to consecrated life all of my life but I was busy seeking worldly honors & adventures. Then a string of calamities began: auto accident with ruptured disk/surgeries, relentless pain into the leg, ovarian mass/hysterectomy, bowel blockage/surgery, prolonged cancer deaths of both parents, sinus surgeries for resistant infections, uncontrolled asthma, and my only sibling suffering from schizophrenia… Although I would not want to repeat the past and still very much cope with serious health problems, I am most grateful that Jesus has allowed this adversity. In the process, I fell head-over-heels in love with Him and His Church and am well on the pathway to the vocation of Consecrated Virginity lived in the World. Thank You, sweet Jesus.
“For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10).
Peace and comfort to you.
There is great joy and love in suffering if we offer our suffering for others and for Christ.
Suffer well. What important advice, for in this life, suffer we will. Ours is a tradition that lifts up each believer’s suffering to join with that of the crucified Lord for the redemption of the world. None other gives our trials and tribulations, our illnesses and tragedies, our pain and anxieties, our real and imagined martyrdoms this kind of dignity.
I remember once casting about frantically for a reason to turn my back on the faith and seizing on suffering. Then I was given the opportunity to rail at a wise person about the unfairness of God and the craziness of believing in a God who would inflict this kind of suffering on his own son. When I had worn myself out with bitterness and vitriol, I was told that if I wanted to, I could lift my misery and pain onto the cross with Jesus where it would be cherished by God’s own suffering human self. Not exactly a “son” as we understand the term, who would be subject to the whims of a despot father, but God’s own human self; a belittling of himself by himself taken on willingly in order to stand with us in our suffering.
I was given to understand that for God to only pretend to be human and just look like he was being mowed down by the cruelty of the world, would be to play a rotten joke on the rest of us who are bound to endure the the brutality of genuine suffering.
I don’t like to suffer, but I am honored that my suffering can be joined with my Lord’s great sacrifice for the forgiveness of sins. What a great charism that is for someone who has absolutely no standing in the world, no greatness she can call her own to give to God.
As always, I am blessed by your thoughtful reflections, and I am praying for us all.
When I suffer,I like to suffer like this … (1Pt 1,1-9 ) In this you rejoice, although now for a little while you may have to suffer through various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire, may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.Although you have not seen him you love him; even though you do not see him now yet believe in him, you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, as you attain the goal of [your] faith, the salvation of your souls.
But is Suffering the only way to grow in or receive grace ?
No
Euthanasia is the enemy of the grace and enlightenment we obtain through suffering. This is why Satan promotes it so avidly.