Why do we have to suffer?

Thousands of painful scenes unfold before our eyes: injustices, abuses, wars, illnesses, abandonment....

A good woman recently asked me how she could face the rehabilitation time she had to go through after her arm operation, she told me she was desperate, she really would not have wanted to live through all that her operation entailed. How many times have we denied the pain and repeated the question "Why me? We complain about our losses and even if we do not live our faith, we are moved to blame God for allowing suffering in our lives. 

Why do we have to suffer? The following phrase of Chesterton gives me the guideline to wield a possible answer, he said: “Our time easily imposes the anguish of the ephemeral to the deserters of eternity”.

A culture without eternity

International organizations and institutions specialized in mental health present alarming figures of the increase of anguish, anxiety and depression around the world, worsening during and after the most recent pandemic (2020). All these symptoms are ways of experiencing fear. There is an inordinate fear of suffering, of not knowing what is coming, of not being in control of events. Our culture, which has abandoned God, does not know how to suffer. If we stop looking at eternity, we become slaves of the ephemeral. If we do not put our trust in God, we put it in ourselves, too small for the challenges of life.

We need to retake the authentic meaning of our existence, we live in this world but we do not belong to it, we are “passing through” towards eternity in the presence of God. Our Creator exists and has spoken to us clearly, he became man, Jesus Christ came to give us the answers to the deepest questions of our being, he is the visible face of the invisible God. 

Christ and the redemptive meaning of pain

We will not get out of this loop of emotional weakness without faith, without reference to the divine. Man can only recognize himself by looking at himself in the mirror of Christ. The true antidote to anxiety and depression - to the underlying fear - is to know how to offer pain. 

Christ modeled this reality for us. He could have eradicated pain with his coming, but instead he took it on and gave it redemptive meaning!. 

Faced with the imminent moment of his free surrender, he lived through unspeakable moments of intense anguish, but, obedient to the extreme, Jesus Christ accepted the pain, embraced it and offered it up. 

We pretend to eliminate pain at all costs and forget the Word of God that says: everything cooperates for our good (Rom. 8, 28). Everything, the good and the bad. We are free and we are living the consequences of freely choosing evil. The whole history of salvation unfolds between a disobedience to God's will and the total obedience of Christ; for the former, pain and death entered, for the latter, genuine joy and eternal life. 

Accepting, offering and transforming suffering

We are not in this world to have a good time, we have come to sanctify ourselves by doing good. 

There is a phrase that points out: pain is inevitable, suffering is optional. It means that when we serenely accept setbacks, when we are humble and recognize that all things are not in our hands, when we say yes, like Mary, we are able to imitate Our Lord and accept, embrace and offer our pain in reparation for our faults and for the good of those we love. Pain does not come to make us unhappy but to sanctify us, to fill us with grace! It is not a matter of suffering in a masochistic way, but of giving to God what he asks of us and even of being grateful for what happens to us, even if it is contrary to our desires. It is not a matter of allowing injustice without further ado; what is asked of us is to face it with courage and charity; to put limits to evil in abundance of good, providing the means that help us all to grow.

It is a fact that God does not want evil or suffering, He has placed before us good and evil so that we may freely choose the good and be happy in fullness. It is not by turning our backs on God that we will fight the evil of the world, it is by loving, by improving ourselves and offering our difficulties that we will build the civilization of love that we long for.

The next time pain knocks at your door, remember Christ who gave all his blood for you. He wants you eternally happy! Join in his passion and death, be a good Cyrenean and offer your pain with total trust. He brings good out of evil. Embrace your cross, give the best of yourself and from the hand of God, wait for the good end.