"Worth Revisiting" Wednesdays - Stop Running Away From Suffering

Thank you Allison Gingras and Elizabeth Riordan for inviting Catholic bloggers to re-post their favorite articles on "Worth Revisiting” Wednesdays.
 
Go there now (and every Wednesday) and gouge yourself on a feast of spiritual treasures.

Be sure to visit Allison at  Reconciled To You and Elizabeth at Theology Is A Verb during the rest of the week.  You will find much spiritual nourishment and encouragement there.

Here is my contribution:

Stop Running Away From Suffering - Embrace It As God's Will for You

(Originally posted April 16, 2014)

As Catholics we are supposed to be counter cultural. But are we?

What spiritual concept is more foreign in today's culture than the idea that we should embrace suffering? Probably none, since the majority of us run away from, reject, and complain about any and all forms of suffering.  We are always looking for some pill to pop or syrup to ingest to get rid of even the slightest physical pain. How many of us seek escape from emotional pain through the abuse of alcohol, drugs, food, and sex?

We forget that Christ not only suffered and died for us but He told us we too  must pick up the crosses He sends us and suffer as did He if we wish to be with Him eternally. If you express that vital teaching today, most of those with whom you share it will mock you for believing so. The fact that they reject this essential Truth doesn't change it from being true!

While we do not have to seek suffering, when it comes our way may we embrace it as God's will for us and draw strength, comfort and encouragement from the words of this great spiritual director:

Admittedly, this is a  lot easier to say than to do. Embracing suffering is impossible without God's grace - grace readily available and sufficient for those who seek and grasp it.

The Wisdom of St. Francis de Sales

On this great teacher's feastday, I thought I would share one of his prayers:

“The Everlasting God has in His wisdom foreseen from eternity the cross that He now presents to you as a gift from His innermost heart. This cross He now sends you is considered with His all-knowing eyes, understood with His divine mind, tested with His wise justice, warmed with loving arms and weighed with His own hands, to see that it be not one inch too large and not one ounce too heavy for you. He has blessed it with His Holy Name, anointed it with His grace, perfumed it with His consolation, taken one last look at you and your courage, and then sent it to you from heaven, a special greeting from God to you, an alms of the all-merciful love of God.”