Homily
for Ordinary Time 5
February
7, 2021
God
In Desolation
“Is not man’s life on earth a
drudgery?” Perhaps Job was thinking of February in Connecticut, as the cold and
the snow and the Coronavirus start to weigh us down!
But truthfully there are many things
that are a drudgery to us – maybe a chronic illness, or a lousy job, maybe
depression or anxiety, or a class that we hate. When faced with such drudgery,
we have two choices. One, we can try to just grit our teeth and get through it,
trying to distract ourselves from how miserable we are by little pleasures and
indulgences. Or, we could invite God into that drudgery and find meaning in the
suffering.
The first option is only temporary,
because we can never eliminate suffering in this life. Even the people that
Jesus cured in the Gospels would get sick again and die. So the second option –
inviting God into that suffering and finding meaning in it – is better and
longer-lasting. Notice that Jesus didn’t stay in that village to become their
doctor – no, He said He needed to go to the other villages primarily to preach
– because He did not come to remove our sufferings, but to give us faith, which
gives meaning to our suffering.
During the Nazi era, an Austrian
Jewish psychologist named Viktor Frankl was imprisoned in Auschwitz. In
addition to putting many Jewish prisoners to death, the Nazis forced healthy
Jewish men to work extremely hard in miserable conditions: laying railroad
tracks, digging trenches, and other backbreaking labor, for long hours in hot
sun and freezing snow, with little food and no rest. It was an existence of
utter drudgery, and many men began to give up their will to live.
Viktor was heading out one morning
on the way to yet another day of misery, feeling much like Job, when he was
startled out of his hopeless thoughts by a chuckle from another prisoner. The
other man looked at him and said, “If only our wives could see us now!” This thought
gave Viktor the strength to persevere – when he thought of his wife, he could
endure any suffering. Later, when released from Auschwitz, he wrote: “Love is
the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. [This is] the
greatest secret that human thought has to impart: The salvation of man is
through love and in love.”
Love gives meaning to suffering. We
can suffer anything if we have someone to suffer for. So the question
is: if suffering is going to come anyway, why not turn that suffering into
love? After all, St. Padre Pio said, “The proof of love is to suffer for the
one you love.”
Three things to remember as we seek
meaning in our everyday suffering:
First, God suffers with us. The
word “compassion” means “to suffer with” – so when it says in the Psalm that
God “heals the brokenhearted,” He is right there, with us, in the midst of our everyday
trials. Suffering is a share in Jesus’ cross, which brings us close to Him.
Mother Teresa once said: “Suffering, pain, sorrow, humiliation, feelings of
loneliness, are nothing but the kiss of Jesus, a sign that you have come so
close to Jesus on the Cross that he can kiss you. I once told this to a lady
who was suffering very much. She answered, ‘Tell Jesus to stop kissing me!’” A very
human reaction! But it’s true – we are never closer to Jesus than when we are
on the Cross with Him, and if we unite our suffering to His on the Cross out of
love for Him, then we literally participate in His work of saving the world!
This should give us comfort and consolation on those dark days.
Second, suffering is meant for us to
become like Christ! Sometimes we feel like God has abandoned us or does not
love us because we are suffering, but the opposite is true – as it says in
Scripture, “He whom the Lord loves, He corrects.” As Protestant Pastor Rick
Warren likes to say, “God cares more about your character than your comfort,” and
it is through suffering that our imperfections are weeded out – and that can be
a painful process. It is through drudgery that we are trained in patience,
courage, humility, perseverance, sacrifice. Suffering can make us bitter, or it
can make us better – like a master sculptor, allow God to use the chisel of
suffering on your life so that He can make a masterpiece of holiness out of
you.
Finally, it is perfectly fine to
seek legitimate relief from suffering, but always with an eye to the eternal
joy promised to believers. If someone has physical pain, they can definitely
take a painkiller – but never forget that we will receive back a glorified body
at the end of time. If someone suffers from depression, they can speak to a
therapist and take medication – while remembering that God will wipe away every
tear from our faces in Heaven. If someone is aching from loneliness, they can
certainly reach out to friends – while keeping their eyes fixed on union with
God, our greatest Love.
I close with the story of a saint
who knew more suffering than most of us: Blessed Herman the Cripple. He was
born in 1013 with spinal bifida, a cleft palate, and cerebral palsy – he was so
deformed that his parents didn’t want him, and they abandoned him on the
doorstep of a local Benedictine monastery. The Benedictines took him in and
taught him about the love of God. Despite his physical and speech handicaps and
the emotional pain of being abandoned by his parents, he had a keen intellect,
and quickly advanced in his studies. He became an expert in many fields –
writing books on history and theology, doing complex astronomical calculations,
learning multiple languages. He went blind later in life, and because of that,
he began to compose hymns, including some of the greatest in our Catholic
treasury like the Salve Regina and Come Holy Spirit. Rather than become bitter,
he surrendered his sufferings to God in love, and became a great scholar,
scientist, author, poet…and saint.
Look at what God can do in the life of one
who suffers for love of Him!
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