The Value of Suffering

By Fr. Gregory Hartmayer, OFM Conv.

(Homily, given 9/1/02)

My Dear Friends,

One of the most difficult challenges of my Priesthood has been to witness or to be a part of another person’s suffering.  It’s very hard to watch a person suffer.  I say that it has been one of the most difficult, but it has also been one of the most rewarding experiences of my Priesthood.  You see, one of the privileges of my priestly ministry is when people invite me into the most intimate and personal part of their lives…their pain and their suffering…whether it be in the confessional, or a hospital room, or a living room, or a Funeral Home, or in my office.  Suffering of any kind, whether it be physical, or spiritual, or emotional, is very painful and has been a part of the mystery of life ever since the time of Adam and Eve.

The question, “Why do people suffer, especially good people?” is a question that has been asked since the beginning of time.  All three of the Scripture readings today speak about suffering.  In the First Reading (see Jer 20: 7-9), we have Jeremiah the prophet crying out that he has been duped, and worse than that, he has allowed himself to be duped!  And who is he crying out to?  He’s crying out to God.  He is talking to God.  He’s telling God that he has had it!  It’s no fun being a prophet.  He’s been laughed at; he’s been mocked; he’s been criticized, and his pain as a prophet has been rejection, and loneliness, and confusion, and being used, and being made to appear as a fool.  He doesn’t even want to mention God’s name anymore.  It’s too risky…too dangerous…too painful.  But then, Jeremiah says that he can’t hold it in anymore!  The message of God and the Word of God is like a fire, burning in his heart.  And so, he doesn’t want to prophesy, he doesn’t want to preach or teach on behalf of God anymore, but at the same time, he can’t hold it back.  Jeremiah is having a very difficult time being a disciple…a very difficult time being the spokesperson for God.

In the Second Reading (see Rom 12: 1-2), we have St. Paul speaking to the Christians in Rome at a very difficult time in our Church’s history, and he tells the people of Rome to offer their bodies as a living sacrifice, as they witness the bloody execution and persecution of Christians in the Coliseum.  And in the Gospel today (see Mt 16: 21-27), we hear that Jesus is preaching that in order to be a disciple, we must deny ourselves and take up our cross.

It’s obvious that God is trying to tell us something this morning about the mystery of suffering.  I do not have an answer.  I do not know why people have to suffer or why God allows it, but I do believe that suffering has a value.  If each of us were to share the many ways and the different ways in which we have experienced suffering in our lives, if each of us got up and told our own story about suffering in our life, we would be overwhelmed by the amount and the depth of suffering that we experience as human beings…as disciples of Christ.  Our sharing would reveal that our suffering is indeed a part of our lives, and that every person, in some way, has experienced suffering.

Ironically, the worst situations and the most painful ones are often the most powerful occasions to experience transformation…and growth…and grace.  Our experiences of suffering in our lives in and of themselves have no redemptive value.  The experience of death, the experience of divorce, the experience of the end of a friendship, the experience of the loss of one’s health, or one’s home, or one’s employment…in and of themselves, those experiences have nothing of any redemptive value… in and of themselves…but in hindsight, we often are able to see that these tragic events in our lives cause us to grow!  They cause us to become more compassionate, to depend more upon God, and to learn some truths about life that God wants us to know.

If we take the time to reflect upon our own suffering, we will probably find out that this is true…that as we look back on those most difficult moments in our lives, when we could not bear the pain any longer…whether it was emotional…or whether it was physical…or whether it was spiritual… if we look back on those moments, we will probably be able to see that there’s something good that came from it.  There was something that helped us face a reality in our life…something that changed a part of us for the better.  It does not necessarily lessen the pain or the loss, but it does allow us to see a good that comes from it.

Of course, there are some people who refuse to accept that suffering has any value, and they simply become bitter and become angry.  But for those of us who are open to the value of suffering, and the lessons that we can learn from it, we will be able to see the growth and the transformation that has taken place in our life.  I’m not saying that we should enjoy suffering or that we should even pray for it or ask for it, but when suffering does enter into our life, that we struggle to accept it and to find whatever good that may come from it.

Suffering can teach us some valuable lessons about life.  Through suffering, we are reminded that we are not in total control of our life.  Suffering helps us become more and more aware of our dependency upon God.  It forces us to accept the reality that we are not God and that we need to trust in Him.  Suffering also teaches us compassion.  The word “compassion” literally means, “to suffer with”.  When I feel compassion for a person, when you feel compassion for another, it’s because you are sharing in their suffering.  That is compassion…to be able to feel, in the depths of your heart, something similar to what the person to whom you are speaking or ministering is also experiencing.  We cannot suffer with someone if we have never suffered ourselves.  Who could understand the suffering of a mother who lost a child, except for a mother who has experienced the same pain?  When we share each other’s suffering, somehow, our own suffering is lessened a little bit.

You know, as I look among you this morning, I see many who have suffered, or who are suffering.  Many of you can stand here with me and witness to the power of prayer and the power of the support of this community in times of pain…in times of suffering.  Whether it be the pain of grief, or the gift of healing, or the freedom of reconciliation, or a share in the resurrection…the suffering that we share as a parish community is soothed by the love of this community.  We feel that our burden is lightened a bit because it’s being carried by more than ourselves.  It’s being carried by our community.  And when we have shared prayer, when we share the Eucharist on Sunday, we are experiencing compassion. We are sharing in each other’s life and in each other’s suffering…even if we don’t know about it!  There is a sense of sharing when there is this community of faith that comes together and there’s the sense of belonging and caring for one another.  Jesus founded His Church for that very same reason…so that we could encounter Him in the sacraments and in the Church…in one another.

As we grow older, we become more and more aware of how we have matured and how we have grown because of the tragic and painful events in our lives.  I am not the same person that I was a year ago.  I’m not the same person I was two years ago, or five years ago.  I have grown…and much of that growth is a direct result of suffering…suffering that I have experienced and suffering that others have shared with me.  Some wise person coined the phrase, “Growing Pains”…and that’s exactly what we experience when we mature.

It certainly is OK to pray that God prevents us or our loved ones from suffering.  It’s OK to pray that we don’t suffer.  It’s OK to pray that God remove our present suffering, but when we find ourselves face to face with suffering, and it is beyond our control, let us humbly pray that we can accept it, and that we can look for the good that may come from it.  Let us accept suffering as a value of life, as a value of the disciple of Christ…to be able to share in His suffering, in a personal and intimate way.  And let us look upon suffering as an opportunity to carry our cross with the crucified Jesus.

St. Paul reminds us that just as we share in the suffering and the death of Christ, so too will we share in a like resurrection.  God love you and God bless you….