Enduring the Pain

Suffering is a two-edged sword, and it often hurts like one. It is universally experienced in one form or another and yet massively misunderstand. It stands as an impediment, to our health, our happiness, our best selves, our securest beliefs. How can I go on when I’m in pain? How can God be loving and allow suffering? Just, why?

It’s part of the human condition; it’s part of the fallen world; it can unite us closer to Christ. All true statements that don’t mean much when someone is actually in distress. They just want the pain to stop, and the philosophizing about it can come after.

Today’s society sees no ambiguity in pain: it is bad. You have the right to never suffer. Drink, eat, fuck, shop—find the distraction that works best. Take pain medication. Take more. Have the doctor assist you in your suicide. The world is too painful. It would have been better if you had never had to suffer at all. It would be better if that child never has to suffer. It would be better if the disabled were gone instead of suffering. It would be better if their caregivers were free of their burdens. A better world has no suffering, but it seems to have a lot of death.

The idea of pain-free life actually diminishes life, because then life that is not pain-free seems inadequate and futile. St. John Paul II said in Evangelium Vitae, “In a social and cultural context which makes it more difficult to face and accept suffering, the temptation becomes all the greater to resolve the problem of suffering by eliminating it at the root, by hastening death so that it occurs at the moment considered most suitable.”

The cases for abortion or euthanasia makes compelling emotional arguments. People are in pain and distress; they are suffering. Of course their choice is understandable. You wouldn’t want to suffer in their place, would you? Life is hard enough; why make it harder?

That God allows suffering is one of the hardest parts of the faith for many to accept. Wouldn’t an all-loving, all-powerful God make pain stop? The answer is that the world is broken; it causes pain. By allowing us freewill, God allows pain to continue. But pain and suffering can be used to bring about good. They draw us closer to God and to one another. When you understand suffering, you understand the need for people to be loved. In pain, you stand with Christ in his passion, with the martyrs in their last moments, with all others who are hurting.

God does not want us to suffering; he does not delight in pain. But he is pleased in our endurance in faith. He is pleased with the hope we hold. He is pleased by the love and compassion we express. Pain is our weakness; the endurance of it is our strength.

Society fears pain so much that it lashes out, promoting addictive drugs or behaviors—to the point of promoting death. Rather, we as a society should help one another endure the pain. True mercy is holding the hand of one hurting, not throwing them away. True dignity loves a person, no matter their circumstance. When one is in turmoil, it sometimes takes several others to help her endure. That’s the importance of community.

"All the science of the Saints is included in these two things: To do, and to suffer. And whoever had done these two things best, has made himself most saintly." -St. Francis de Sales