S1 E14: The Journey of Suffering and Faith

Transcript

Carol Vassar:

From SS. Isidore and Maria Parish in Glastonbury, Connecticut, I'm Carol Vassar, and this is Living in Faith, Hope, and Love. Each week, our Pastor, Father Mark Suslenko, delves into Scripture, shares insights from the saints, prophets, and theologians, and discusses practical ways to cultivate faith, strengthen hope, and embody love in the world around us. Through his reflections and spiritual encouragement, this podcast aims to inspire you to live your Catholic faith with joy and purpose. Welcome. 

In John’s Gospel, Jesus gives his disciples this very well-known commandment: “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another.”

In today’s homily, Father Mark explores the idea of love through the lens of suffering, and the idea that they are not really opposites, but are, in fact, companions on a journey, bound together in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.

“The Journey of Suffering and Love,” by Father Mark S. Suslenko, Pastor, SS. Isidore and Maria Parish, Glastonbury, Connecticut

Father Mark Suslenko:

One of the things that trips us up, whether we're a believer or a nonbeliever, is the reality of suffering in our world. We have a very difficult time putting God's love, God's unconditional love, together with the suffering that we see occurring in almost every corner of our world. And so, it begs that huge question: How can a God of love allow all of this suffering to happen? And in a secular mind without faith, that's a very difficult question to answer. And it sometimes makes or breaks whether someone does come to believe in Jesus Christ as God's son.

And so, this reality of suffering: if you look at it from purely secular perspective, when I undergo suffering and I'm asked to endure hardship and pain, the secular world without faith can easily take that and turn it inward, and we find ourselves saying things like, "Why me," or, "What did I do to deserve this? Why do I have to go through this trial?" And it can lead us to feeling bitter and even angry, and quickly lead us to a place of despair because suffering can make or break us.

But listen carefully to what the disciples said as they were going out to begin preaching the Good News. We have to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God. We have to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God, not to preach the kingdom of God, to enter the kingdom of God. So, hardship and suffering right, off the bat, is linked with entering the kingdom of God.

Let's look for a minute at some of the causes of suffering in our world. One major cause of suffering in our world can be attributed to what we can call evil and sin. Evil and sin. This is suffering that is the result of greed, suffering that's the result of domination, suffering that's the result of self-preservation. And so, when we witness young children not having enough to eat, there's no reason for that other than human greed.

When someone who is very innocent suffers at the hands of another, there's no reason for that other than human sinfulness. And so, a lot of the injustice that we see occurring around us and a lot of the cause of human pain is due to our choices, and the result of our cooperation with evil and sin.

If we choose grace and love and mercy over evil and sin, that suffering would not occur directly due to human choice. And so, the Christian immersed in this environment, of course, is called to do all in their power to alleviate suffering. God does not want us to endure any more than is necessary, and so we have the power to bring down the temperature on this suffering that is caused by evil and sin and respond and alleviate that pain and agony.

In addition to evil and sin, the next cause of suffering can be rooted in what I call freedom. Freedom. Now, what does this mean? God is love. That's very clear going right out of the gate. God is love. Now, anyone who has ever embarked on the journey of love realizes that love can only be authentic if it comes out of a place of freedom, out of a place of freedom. I have to choose to love. So, if Deacon Bill tells me I must love you, my love comes from a place of coercion. I'm being told to do it. I'm being told to do it. It's not true and authentic love. True. And authentic love has to be freely given. And it has to exist in freedom. So, when God creates the world, he creates everything we see out of love, and he creates you and I out of love. And one of the gifts that comes with that creation out of love is freedom. Because one of the things we treasure more than anything is the gift of free will, of being able to choose this over that. To say yes or no, to choose good or bad. And that freedom that is built into us is also built into the world. God does not control the world. He allows the world to unfold as it is and as it does. He's not the puppeteer holding strings and manipulating things. And so a world that exists in freedom comes with the beauty and wonder of creation and creativity and all of those glorious things we marvel at: the beauty of a sunset, the vastness of a mountain, but it also comes with things like illness and incompleteness and brokenness and natural disasters, all of which can cause suffering, not because God is causing it, but because it comes from the freedom that is built in to the very stuff of life, the freedom of love.

And so, we have some suffering that's caused from evil and sin, some suffering that's caused because of the freedom in which we live and in which the world finds itself. And then we have some suffering that's caused simply by love itself. Think about it for a moment. Authentic love must be accompanied by self-sacrifice. In other words, if I'm going to love another person, I have to purge myself of my ego, my wants, and my desires in order to put myself out there as an extension to another. And when I do that, I also open myself up to being pruned and honed, and I also open myself up to being wounded. There is no act of authentic loving that doesn't come with some cost, with some sacrifice, with some element of suffering. It can't be. And so we're so used to thinking of suffering being on this side, rimmed in darkness, as something to be avoided at all costs, and love existing on this side as something that feels good and is to be embraced. Is it possible that they're actually found together? That they're really part of the same spectrum? That we need love to perfect our suffering, and we need suffering to perfect our love.

Now, with the eyes of faith, this is true. Think for a moment about that image that is very familiar to all of us, and it's the image of our blessed mother after Jesus has died, holding her son in her lap: the Pieta. In that moment, love and suffering are found together, with the very breaking of her heart flows out this intense love. Think of the crucifixion itself. As Christ endured all of that suffering and all of that pain and hung upon that cross, there, in that moment, love and suffering are wedded together. The intense pain of suffering gives forth to the unconditional love God has for us.

And so when Jesus told his disciples to love, he gave them a commandment to love. Not to go out and preach warm fuzzies to people, but to go out and suffer for the sake of others so that that love that they share is authentic and real and not fake and superficial. Jesus wants us to love as he loved with the gift of suffering.

To the secular world, this makes no sense, but to us who believe it makes perfect sense. It is only when we learned how to suffer that we learn the depths of true love. Because in those moments of agony and pain, we touch a divine blessing that we would not otherwise have touched.

And so the question really becomes through us, as you look upon the crucified Christ, there before us is God, who is truth and love in person; in person. A God who suffered and died for our salvation. How much do we believe this truth? Do we believe it strong enough and deep enough to willingly suffer ourselves? Do we believe it enough so that it makes our suffering worthwhile? Do we believe it enough to trust that, in our suffering, we will be transformed and brought to new levels of enlightenment and union that otherwise would not be known?

God in and of himself has no need to suffer, but God certainly suffers with each one of us, that's for sure. He is no stranger to suffering because he's no stranger to love. And so as we go through the trials of life, however big, however small, however intense, if we do so armed with our faith, then we will have the ability to put our egos aside to embrace the path upon which life is asking us to trod, and to do so with the certitude of hope that we are being led into a great mystery of suffering, a great mystery of life, that in the end is going to bring me where I need to be, who I'm meant to be, and in the union with the one I have loved all along.

The journey of suffering is a journey of love. To be authentic and true, it must be embraced with the certitude of hope and the depth of faith.

Carol Vassar:

Father Mark Suslenko is the pastor of SS. Isidore and Maria Parish in Glastonbury, Connecticut. If you like what you've heard today, please subscribe to Living in Faith, Hope, and Love on your favorite podcast app, and take a moment to leave a review.

SS. Isidore and Maria is an active parish community, so whether you’re a long-time parishioner or are just getting to know us through this podcast, we welcome you to join us at Masses or any of our other community events and services. Visit our parish website - isidoreandmaria.org - for a full schedule of Masses, services and other happenings. That's isidoreandmaria.org. We're also active on Facebook and Instagram.

On behalf of Father Mark, I'm Carol Vassar, and we thank you for listening to this episode of Living in Faith, Hope, and Love.