Much guidance can be found on how to suffer profitably, how to think of suffering, and why it even exists. But one of the things I’ve struggled with in my prayer life is how to pray for loved ones who find themselves in the midst of suffering. And now that I seem to be surrounded by so much of it, I find myself asking these questions again.
Several years back, my husband had to undergo three surgeries in the span of two years. Like many men though, he somehow knows how to suffer well, and other than play Florence Nightingale and do all the things I do anyway as his wife, there wasn’t much beyond prayer that I could offer.
Trust an overthinker to even worry about this, but my question always has been: Should we be praying that our loved ones be relieved, spared, or healed, knowing that they are being purified and perfected, and that this is their opportunity to unite their pain with Christ’s cross, which cannot be wrenched apart from salvation?
There are those who are able to see gift and grace even in suffering; there are those who don’t. A quiet suggestion to “offer it up” isn’t something one can say to everyone, only to those who understand and appreciate the redemptive value of suffering. And what of the loved one who refuses to let you share his pain, wanting to spare you what he wrongly assumes would be a burden to you?
Ultimately how a person handles suffering is between him and his Father. Will it make him turn away from God, or cause him to cling even more?
I’ve been reading Job lately and seeing myself in his friends. Well-meaning though they were, I couldn’t help but breathe a mea culpa in those instances when it seemed they did nothing but add insult to injury. To sit and simply listen to another’s woes, to refrain from saying the wrong thing or offering unwanted advice, to watch in silence… all these can be tough, but sometimes they’re all we’re called to do.
In the end, our prayer needs to be “Your Will be done.” And yet even Jesus in Gethsemane asked His Father, if possible, to let that cup pass from Him.
We are blessed when we are able to directly ease another person’s pain, but what about those times when we aren’t able to? There is, of course, the natural desire to see people delivered from it because it pains us to see them suffer — is it selfishness then to ask for that? The temptation to turn away can get unbearable sometimes. Simon of Cyrene didn’t exactly volunteer to get that close to Jesus and His Cross, though he was transformed in a way he couldn’t have been, had he stayed a bystander. I often pray that my intentions be purified, that my thoughts and prayers be rooted in love. We can pray for grace, not only for our loved ones who carry their crosses, but also for ourselves who walk this path with them.
We are not guaranteed a pain-free existence in this world, no matter how our suffering-averse society tries to convince us of it. More than any physical pain, though, the spiritual struggle is an unavoidable component of any suffering. Whether suffering is temporary or one that brings our loved ones to life’s end, inviting them to focus their eyes past the Cross, to the eternal happiness that awaits, is the most compassionate thing we can do.
But, as it is written,
“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
nor the heart of man conceived,
what God has prepared for those who love him,” – 1 Corinthians 2:9
On this, Pope Saint John Paul II’s feast day, I take much comfort in thinking upon his life, for he too, suffered much. Pope Saint John Paul II, pray for us!
Helpful reading:
Salvifici Doloris
Making Sense Out of Suffering
Love and Suffering: The Paradox of Love
A Tsunami Cannot Be Drawn in Pastels: On Dignity and Suffering
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