thoughts on suffering

Today is the feast of Corpus Christi, when we celebrate the Word made flesh among us, living even today as our "Living Bread."
I am so thankful for the Eucharist, wanting always to commune each day with Christ in this special way. I thought alot about this yesterday, when I was spending a few minutes in prayer before the tabernacle being grateful for my vocation as mom and wife, and trying to be open to receiving the grace I need each day to do the best I can at the Holy Work he's given me to do.
(more on that later)

I thought it was ironic that I was sitting there, praying to Jesus, adoring Jesus, and that I am always telling people in religion forums to "Take God out of the box they had put Him in." Ironic because here I was, praying to my Jesus living and present in a special way in a box in the front of my church, on special orders from my priest, who had (rightly) discerned during my confession that the source of much of my suffering was that I was forgetting to be grateful.

That "box," however physical, transcends all boxes. To me, it's the culmination of the incarnation, of God making Himself present among us always. It's my hope of heaven, it's the sweet taste of salvation.... it's the glory, honor, power, and mercy of my Lord, all wrapped up in a humble piece of ordinary bread.

He comes to us in a manger, to be savior of the world, fragile as a baby. He is still present to us today in our food which gives us a taste of eternal life, fragile as a piece of bread. We love Him as a baby because we can't believe that He would love us so much that He would put Himself in our hands. We love Him in the bread and wine, source of strength for what lies ahead, because we can't believe that He would feed us.

Yes, don't get me wrong, He lives in our hearts, but He lives AMONG us as well--- in communion we commune not only with Him but with each and every person sharing at the table... because we eat the Bread of Life, we all become one Body. I love this special day where we celebrate that.

And it's very appropriate that I'm meditating on these things today. I had a rough confession yesterday.... absolutely brutal. I've been harboring some things in my life, in my marriage, in my motherhood, in my relationships that I rarely share. Yesterday, I shared them with Jesus---some of them for the first time. My palms were sweaty and my heart was pounding before confession-- it's so hard to look someone, especially someone you've come to consider a friend, in the eye and say these horrible things you have hidden away. Harder still to wonder what is going through his very "human" mind. Thankfully, we both know that he is representing a far less "human" God for me who loves me with a love that knows no bounds.

I''ll be blunt. Abstaining from sex before our marriage has deepened our prayer life. In ways I didn't even think to ask for, but that I'm glad for now. Somehow, over the last few months, I've grown up in the Lord. I don't see things the same way. I don't percieve God's plan as something distant and far off and unreachable, but I can see it clearly.
I'm not hanging on my husband's every word, waiting for him to get the proper vision to propel it anymore. I've learned to take responsibility for my own spirituality, all the while letting him lead. I'm not desperately seeking answers for why God is allowing what He is in my life. I'm not resigned to them. I'm humbled instead.... something I never really understood until now.

In confession yesterday, one of my big problems was the idea of fake it-til-you-make-it-praise. As I pondered my own suffering over the month, I thought about my evangelical attitude towards it--- a light hearted glossing over of what my experience was, a "praise Him anyways," kind of attitude, which- although not wrong persay-- definitely didn't leave room for growth. I was reaching for joy in an external manner, trying to find something to cling to that I could be thankful for, all the while continuing to resent God's plan in my heart. I felt that I was destined to be like Job. I remember countless moments during worship when we'd be singing the powerful song "Blessed be the name of the Lord."
That song had a special meaning to me because I sang it almost constantly when I was suffering through my punishments in basic training. Everytime I had to stand at parade rest for an entire day in a field in the mud, every time I had to wear the same dirty, smelly, sweaty clothes again, every time I had to sleep on the floor with no pillow or blanket, every time I didn't get food, every time I didn't get church, every time they didn't let me see my husband... I would burst into song--- "Blessed be the name of the Lord, blessed be Your Name..... You give and take away, my heart will choose to say, Blessed be your name." When all is well, blessed. When all is dark, blessed.

The problem was, my source of strength in those moments came not from the blessed name of the Lord. It came from me-- from dwelling on the fact that I was going through hell, that I was being strengthened, that God was going to continue being a good God and that eventually, all would be good again for me.

These days, I'm learning the aspect of the Christian walk that did get glossed over in my protestant mindset, the acts of mortification and penance which temper and form our whole selves into the shape of holiness. I'm learning to offer up my suffering to God--- not just to say that, but to literally take each pain I experience and to hold it in my heart and say: "For You, my God, for You!" I'm not so prideful in my "assurance of salvation." I'm aware that at any moment, I could die. Will I be ready to face God in that moment?

Much of that understanding comes from reflecting on the lives of the Saints. There's this great scene in the movie Therese, based on the life of St Therese de Lisieux, where the mean nun who always gives her a hard time frowns at her and says: "what on earth are you always smiling about? Every time I see you you are smiling!"
Therese looks her in the eye and grins: "I'm smiling because... I'm happy to see you!"
Her "little way" is so disconcerting because instead of holding on to our frustration because we have a right, we can offer it up and for the first time in our lives, MEAN IT... "My Jesus, I love you. I'll take this cross for you. Save souls."

This is not new to me in the sense that I long ago learned to let go of my "right to be right."
However, only within the context of Catholicism do I find PURPOSE and MEANING in that suffering. As my priest said yesterday during my teary confession: "It's not a question of pretending that the suffering isn't there, or of skipping over it because you want to be Holy. God acknowledges that suffering in your offering it to Him. You can too."

It makes caring for a frustrating husband and two needy children when you dream of other things some days so simple: "My Jesus, I love you. I'll take this cross for you. Save souls."
When I serve my husband and he doesn't deserve it, I can offer my sacrifice to God for my husband. Acts of mortification and penance are like... prayer power times 200. Not only is your prayer out there, but you are literally living your prayer. There is no distinction in Catholicism between your "spiritual life" and your "physical life." If you are living your Catholicism correctly, you will never hear someone ask you: "How's your spiritual life?"

If I want to see my husband in heaven, I will serve him. I will offer that up to God and plead for God's mercy on him. My actions AND thoughts AND heart are in line with God's will. My whole being, even the flesh, is sanctified. It's like learning to live heaven here on earth. Not by my power, but not WITHOUT my power too. God acknowledges that I'm suffering, and offering. In turn, He pours out grace. Which I must learn to recieve, not take from Him.

Mother Teresa once said: "If you knew everyone's story, you would love everyone." I can't tell you how powerful that is. When I'm tired of serving, I look at the ones who are frustrating me and I put myself in their shoes, reminding myself of their story.
If my husband doesn't know how to love me right all the time, but I can remember that he is the product of a severely disfunctional marriage, has a heritage of over a dozen divorces to overcome, that he was always taught that weakness was sickness, that he has no example of good parenting to draw from, that he has no hope for the future because he was always told he would amount to nothing, that he has wounds in his body and soul from a childhood that should never have been-- THEN can I love him with the eyes of Jesus. Then can I see the face of Christ in him, even in his darkest moments when he is-- by all human accounts--- just wrong.

Padre Pio said that the beginning of all of our problems was to ask the question "Why." I love that too--- it helps to ground my suffering in God's plan, to help me to offer it up, to give me strength to just DO even if I don't feel like it-- it removes the load of pain that comes with the process. If I don't ask "why, God?" I won't be frustrated when I don't get the answers, but I will be humbled when they come. I realize that that is not something people can do right off the bat-- it's our very human instinct to demand a reckoning from God. But what great holiness resides in Padre Pio's weathered face when he, at peace, presided over Holy Mass.... that holiness came from an unearthly source of strength. He was greatly blessed for it, and it cost him dearly... just like all the other saints.

I've found great meaning in my suffering, and I no longer feel that I am searching for a balance between acknowledging it's presence in my life, and pushing it out of the way to make room for light. I finally understand the phrase:
"My yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Mat 11:30)