Notes on Suffering
A year and a half ago a friend of mine was married, and someone very close to him reached out about difficulties he had getting over the loss of someone he loved. I had just delivered a best-man speech for my friend and he was moved by some of the Christian overtones so he asked for my perspective on what his suffering could all mean.
I was very honored to be asked, but also very nervous. When we act as representatives of the faithful in this way we really stress about getting it all right! I had pre-written it to make sure it was good, and then I sent it off to him. I have heard he looks at it often to help him in his grief.
Since I've made this blog I thought maybe it would be a good idea to share the contents, in case it helps others.
It’s mostly been Christian philosophers and theologians that have tried to find meaning in suffering of ourselves and others. The answers aren’t going to be definitive answers of “this is why suffering exists” or “this is why evil exists,” but they at least are lessons about possible explanations for why God allows these things to happen. We can never really know the full nature of God - we are limited in what He reveals to us through our human reason and what He reveals to us through divine revelation in the deposit of faith.
What we experience when we suffer is at least in one respect like the purpose of crying - or at least that’s one thing I think about ever since I saw the Disney movie Inside Out. The protagonist tries to bundle up her sadness because she thought she should always try to be a happy girl, but the sadness - which is the outward expression of inward suffering - calls others to action around us so that they can help us through our tough times. When they help us out in this times they are assisting us in carrying the cross we have been given just like St. Veronica and St. Simon. Through that assistance we aren't the only ones who are helped: those who help us are better formed to be more generous, kind, thoughtful, and compassionate people. Our suffering helps cut through all of the distractions of life like a radiant beam through, putting into perspective all of the things that we spend countless amounts of time fretting over. It helps show that, in the grand scheme of things, many of our worries are unimportant. So our sadness and our suffering help bring others to more perfect virtue.
For us, our suffering acts in a similar form. Our inward thoughts are often obsessed with the most of immediate concerns - because that’s what humans do. An Italian philosopher named Pico della Mirandola talked about how human nature is the only nature which can ascend or descend in contrary to its basic nature. He says we can be plant-like and just be concerned with our survival, animal-like and be concerned about our feelings and desires (passions), human like and plan for the future in the most practical of ways, or divinized and concerned with heavenly things like the will of God and the dignity of the human person.
We often get stuck between animal and basic human nature which are still very much focused on the fulfillment of desires and accomplishment of practical goals. We use our reason to plan out new and creative ways to fulfill our desires which can often be manifested in our love of material possessions. But in suffering, especially suffering we have no control over, we realize that that rational nature which purports the ability to always get itself out of every situation and plan for every contingency is not itself sufficient in every possible case. There are many cases outside of the “ordinary path” of life which reason has little to no control over.
In these moments, that act of yielding to the possibility of something bad happening that we can’t do anything about recenters our lives around things that are more important in many cases. Love within our family is itself an analogy of the divine love between the trinitarian Persons and it greatly radiates the glory of God. This is why having a family is properly called a vocation - we are called to it in order to help propagate God’s will on earth and thus bring forth the kingdom of Heaven. That love is good in itself - it’s a transcendental property of all creation because love is the causal property of all creation. God created out of love for the sake of love. When we make a family we participate in the creative nature of God and hopefully for the same purpose and end.
We focus on the good which can often be manifested in the thoughts of “what kind of legacy am I going to leave behind?” Us ordinary folks aren’t famous or fabulously wealthy. We aren’t going to make it into the annals of history. But nevertheless we still often fixate on this question. Why? It’s because we want to set up those who treat us as an example for their own lives to be good stewards of what we have given them and what has been given to them by others. We want them to be generous with their gifts. We want them to have good relationships with their family and their future kids. These are the goods we consider important enough to consider in the legacy we are leaving behind. When we’re in this mindset - this philosophical mindset - we do a better job separating the wheat from the chaff. The good is defined as the end which our wills ought to seek. Where the “ought” comes in is going to be a bit personal, but we can never go wrong by aligning our wills with the will of our Creator as we can understand it, which we should diligently seek to cooperate with.
We also focus on the beautiful, which is another transcendental! All of creation is beautiful and we want to experience these beautiful moments. We want to see all the variety in creation and experiences. Some people fixate on this and go do things like travel the world or go sky diving. These aren’t misguided attempts at focusing on the beautiful things in life when we have the new perspective, but there is also beauty in moments in the finitude of this earthly life. In the fixation on moments and experiences with those important to us - like getting to attend a wedding.
Suffering is a way that we become re-centered because all of the ancillary things stop mattering so much. And by focusing on these important elements of life and giving our beloved an uplifting example we are said to be “suffering well.” And there is something especially saintly about that - though it’s never easy.
But we need to remember that never suffer alone.
Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.1
When Jesus says to follow Him, He does not just talk about hypotheticals. He means it. The cross we are to take up - He took it up first with forgiveness on His lips and arms outstretched in superabundant love. The path of self denial He asks us to take - He did it first in His earthly ministry of poverty and humility. The life He asks us to be ready to lose - He gave it up for us first and called us "friends."
Christ did not come here to abolish all suffering in this life; He came here to suffer with us. Ask Him for help to bear your cross and you will come out the other end more like Him.
Footnotes
-
Matthew 16:24 ↩