How do we understand the nature of God when it comes to suffering?
As a Catholic, I have often heard and read about the importance of suffering in the light of love. The saints, after all, almost always seem to talk about suffering:
“If you really want to love Jesus, first learn to suffer, because suffering teaches you to love.” – St. Gemma Galgani
“He who wishes to love God does not truly love Him if he has not an ardent and constant desire to suffer for His sake.” – St. Aloysius Gonzaga
“Suffering is a great grace; through suffering the soul becomes like the Saviour; in suffering love becomes crystallised; the greater the suffering, the purer the love.” – St. Faustina
Suffering has become so ingrained in Catholic teaching that I remember being afraid of being holy.
Suffering seems to be a kind of good with all kinds of rewards. But I just can’t shake off the thought that something is not right with suffering.
Later on, I have realized that suffering in itself is indeed not something good. Why suffer? Why bear so much pain? God never intended a life of misery for us. God wanted us to live a life of eternal joy!
Everything changed, however, when sin came. With the fall came death and all sorts of suffering.
To save us from an eternal life of suffering, God sent His Son.
“And the Word became flesh
and made his dwelling among us,
and we saw his glory,
the glory as of the Father’s only Son,
full of grace and truth.”
– John 1:14 NABRE
Jesus Christ took on our human nature and suffered just like us (except for sin). He suffered on the cross and died. He experienced betrayal, abandonment and grief.
From then on, we learned that suffering can also be redemptive if we bear our sufferings with Christ.
Suffering in itself is not good. But suffering out of love is an act of holiness that brings about so much good.
That is why we often hear the saints talk about suffering. In suffering, we learn what patience is. In suffering, we learn about unselfishness and self-giving.
These are the things Jesus revealed to us with His suffering. He revealed what true love meant. That it is not only doing good when life is comfortable. To love is to continue doing what is right and desiring the good of others even if it means pain and suffering.
God Himself came to us and suffered the most excruciating pains at the cross out of His great love for us.
All of these things, I could understand. What’s more difficult to think about is when I had to tackle the Catholic teaching that in His Divine nature, God is immune to suffering!
“God is infinite, eternal, immutable, incomprehensible, almighty.” (CCC 202)
“In God there is no variation or shadow due to change.” (CCC 212, cf. James 1:17)
Wait, after struggling to accept the importance of suffering, I now have to learn that God cannot suffer and that God can love without suffering?
Suddenly, I felt God to be distant once again. Since He cannot suffer as a God, I felt alone in my sorrows and pains.
The only thing that helped me was clinging on to Jesus Christ. Jesus truly suffered, did He not?
Yes, but they said that although the human nature of Jesus suffered, His Divine nature remained free from suffering.
How could it be? Is Jesus then somehow divided? Is He only a human being after all guided by God?
But the Catholic faith also teaches that Jesus is not divided like that. Jesus has both a human and a Divine nature but He is still one person. He is both human and Divine!
“In Christ there are two natures, the divine and the human, not confused, but united in the one Person of God’s Son.”(CCC 481)
“Jesus Christ is true God and true man.” (CCC 464)
“The only Son of the Father… consubstantial with the Father.” (CCC 465)
When we say that Jesus suffered, it is God the Son who truly suffered. His Divine nature may have remained unharmed, but through His human nature, He truly felt our pain and our sorrows.
“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.”- Hebrews 4:15 NRSVCE
“The Son of God… worked with human hands; he thought with a human mind; he acted with a human will; and with a human heart he loved.” (CCC 470)
Jesus Christ is both Divine and human, and as a human being, He suffered and revealed to us the depths of God’s love.
“The Son of God… assumed a human nature in order to accomplish our salvation in it.” (CCC 461)
“Who, though he was in the form of God,… emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness” – Philippians 2:6-7 NRSVCE
“The Son of God… suffered in his human nature for our salvation.” (cf. CCC 470, 604)
All of these things are not easy to understand, but we can pray for God to give us the grace and the wisdom to do so.
Whenever we feel confused, let us fix our gaze upon Jesus Christ. He is God, but He chose to also become a human being to dwell with us and to suffer for our salvation.
Nothing could ever change His nature as God. And thus, nothing could ever change His love.
We find it hard to understand the Father we cannot see. But the only begotten Son has revealed Himself to us.
“No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father’s side, has revealed him.” – John 1:18 NABRE
God is love. And while we were yet sinners, Jesus Christ died for us and taught us what love is all about.
“Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.”- 1 John 4:8 NABRE
“No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”- John 15:13 NABRE
Jocelyn Soriano is the author of 366 Days of Compassion.
Read more on Patheos – Seek. Understand.
