Does God care about our temporal happiness or only His will?

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Elena321

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Does God care about our earthy happiness or does He only care that his will be done?
Eg:why does God leave some people in such sickness or hardship while others have blessed live and talk about how blessed they are -eg:having looks,going on holidays,financial ease etc(Christians too) ?
Is it that the poor/sick/vulnerable’s suffering are for Gods purpose/will so he does really care less about their temporal happiness?

It seems like there is a lot of unfairness in Christianity/Gods ways.

Also,I don’t understand why God would “bless” some people by being born into Catholic families and not others?
Isn’t this unfair?
I was born/Baptised into a (non practising) Catholic family but what about people that are born Muslim or Hindu etc-is this also for Gods purpose or just “random” so to speak:confused:
 
Not either/or. It is always both/and. He knows that we are truly happy, will inherit eternal joy, and are not following the emptiness of our egos and sensual desires, if we submit to him and His perfect will.
 
The problem with our “temporal happiness” as a Divine goal is that we ourselves don’t seek for it properly.

Scripture never promises anybody temporal happiness, anyhow. Eternity is a better deal.

ICXC NIKA
 
Elena321 said:
Does God care about our earthy happiness or does He only care that his will be done?
Eg:why does God leave some people in such sickness or hardship while others have blessed live and talk about how blessed they are -eg:having looks,going on holidays,financial ease etc(Christians too) ?
Is it that the poor/sick/vulnerable’s suffering are for Gods purpose/will so he does really care less about their temporal happiness?

It seems like there is a lot of unfairness in Christianity/Gods ways.

Also,I don’t understand why God would “bless” some people by being born into Catholic families and not others?
Isn’t this unfair?
I was born/Baptised into a (non practising) Catholic family but what about people that are born Muslim or Hindu etc-is this also for Gods purpose or just “random” so to speak:confused:
Click to expand...
Pure happiness won’t be found in this life; that was the idea behind the “Promised Land”. Yet the sooner we know this the better chance we have for a deeper peace even now, knowing that we’re heading towards something immensely better. And regardless of our background, God gives sufficient grace to all in order for them to find Him. Even being born Catholic is a dubious blessing until we find God for ourselves; that’s when we really become Catholic.
 
God is Infinite.

Difficult for us temporal finite creatures to visualize.
 
I think you already know the answer.
You’re just frustrated at things you can’t change.
Join the club.
Pray, love God with all your heart, and see if things don’t turn out just swell on the last day.
Take your frustrations to Adoration.
peace
 
We won’t see how abject we are and how in love God is until we see him face to face. It will sweep us off our feet. We will be enraptured

God loves people born in Muslim, Hindu, and atheist families to an infinite degree. He does not love them less than Christians or Catholic Christians. It is man’s love that is fickle. We look at a picture of N Korean soldiers marching in a line and we might see uniforms because of how spiritually dense we are; something that is deeply offensive to Our Lord. God sees each one of them as his son, and he would have gone to the cross if it meant dying for just one of them and nobody else. Each of them was cherished in the Divine Mind from all eternity.
 
Having an easy and comfortable life might not be helpful to someone. God uses suffering too. It’s not unfair, just as it is not unfair that a parent would not always buy their child every toy they want, out of concern for the child. God wants what is best for us, not what we in our very limited understanding think is best…

For example, in my life, I believe some things I went through as a child eventually prepared me for the Gospel. I’m glad now that God used it that way.

There’s nothing wrong with God wanting our eternal happiness and sometimes allowing (not causing) earthly suffering to help us get there. If we understood what He understands, we would agree too. It doesn’t mean He wants to cause us pain or likes that, no. It means that there is maybe not another way, and He would rather us suffer a little and then be always happy, rather than lose us forever. He wants us to be with Him so that we would be happy. We wouldn’t be happy without Him because our hearts were made for God.
 
Others probably feel similarly, but I’ve recently come to the conclusion that God’s plan for human salvation somehow depends on me being miserable. From physical issues to mental issues to extreme loneliness, etc. I’m to the point where I don’t even want to pray for specific intentions because it seems that the opposite will happen. I don’t know who it’s good for because it sure doesn’t seem like it’s good for me as it’s driving me away from God.

At this point, it’s hard for me to even say that I love God. It seems I just go along out of fear. In the end, maybe that will be enough.
 
Elena321 said:
Does God care about our earthy happiness or does He only care that his will be done?
Eg:why does God leave some people in such sickness or hardship while others have blessed live and talk about how blessed they are -eg:having looks,going on holidays,financial ease etc(Christians too) ?
Is it that the poor/sick/vulnerable’s suffering are for Gods purpose/will so he does really care less about their temporal happiness?

It seems like there is a lot of unfairness in Christianity/Gods ways.

Also,I don’t understand why God would “bless” some people by being born into Catholic families and not others?
Isn’t this unfair?
I was born/Baptised into a (non practising) Catholic family but what about people that are born Muslim or Hindu etc-is this also for Gods purpose or just “random” so to speak:confused:
Click to expand...
The Catechism provides some guidance on this topic:309 If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: * the goodness of creation, * the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, * the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, * his gift of the Spirit, * his gathering of the Church, * the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance.
There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.

310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite power God could always create something better.174 But with infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world “in a state of journeying” towards its ultimate perfection. In God’s plan this process of becoming involves the appearance of certain beings and the disappearance of others, the existence of the more perfect alongside the less perfect, both constructive and destructive forces of nature. With physical good there exists also physical evil as long as creation has not reached perfection.175
 
Baltimore Catechism:
  1. Q. Why did God make you?
    A. God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him for ever in heaven.
  2. Q. What must we do to save our souls?
    A. To save our souls, we must worship God by faith, hope, and charity; that is, we must believe in Him, hope in
    Him, and love Him with all our heart.
source:

sacred-texts.com/chr/balt/index.htm
 
pianistclare said:
I think you already know the answer.
You’re just frustrated at things you can’t change.
Join the club.
Pray, love God with all your heart, and see if things don’t turn out just swell on the last day.
Take your frustrations to Adoration.
peace
Click to expand...
In our various daily prayers … Morning Offering, Acts of Faith, etc. … we put ourselves in God’s Hands. We learn gradually what His wishes are for us to learn and do.

Eventually, we may even appreciate what He has set before us.
 
Bataar said:
Others probably feel similarly, but I’ve recently come to the conclusion that God’s plan for human salvation somehow depends on me being miserable. From physical issues to mental issues to extreme loneliness, etc. I’m to the point where I don’t even want to pray for specific intentions because it seems that the opposite will happen. I don’t know who it’s good for because it sure doesn’t seem like it’s good for me as it’s driving me away from God.

At this point, it’s hard for me to even say that I love God. It seems I just go along out of fear. In the end, maybe that will be enough.
Click to expand...
We all have to struggle with physical and moral evil.

Catechism
310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite power God could always create something better.174 But with infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world “in a state of journeying” towards its ultimate perfection. In God’s plan this process of becoming involves the appearance of certain beings and the disappearance of others, the existence of the more perfect alongside the less perfect, both constructive and destructive forces of nature. With physical good there exists also physical evil as long as creation has not reached perfection.175

311 Angels and men, as intelligent and free creatures, have to journey toward their ultimate destinies by their free choice and preferential love. They can therefore go astray. Indeed, they have sinned. Thus has moral evil, incommensurably more harmful than physical evil, entered the world. God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral evil.176 He permits it, however, because he respects the freedom of his creatures and, mysteriously, knows how to derive good from it:
For almighty God. . ., because he is supremely good, would never allow any evil whatsoever to exist in his works if he were not so all-powerful and good as to cause good to emerge from evil itself.177​
 
Suffering can either bring us closer to God or away from God. In order for it to bring us closer to God, we need to trust in His goodness.
 
Tbh I don’t think any of these are answers are very good, remember, most of the people on this site are lay people, not experts on the faith. It is good to get other opinions/bounce ideas off of people, but you should also seek answers from a trusted priest or spiritual author and that deseves more weight in general.

I will attempt to give my own answer though and I believe this is closer to The Truth. In The Bible God says “My ways are not your ways, and as high as the heavens above The Earth are My ways above your ways”. So remember, God’s way and the world’s or the enemy’s/devil’s way are often times (if not always) completely opposites. I have been struggling with the same thoughts and things you’ve mentioned myself. I have been out of college for a couple years and despite talent and intelligence I have found myself in a pretty long, rough trial. Not only that, but I struggled because it seemed that many people who deserted me or hurt me when I was down seemed to be getting “blessed” with everything I desired and prayed for, jobs houses, marriage, and support and love and encouragement. It even seemed that the worse oeople had treated me the more they were “blessed”, seemingly just to spite me somehow.

But then I realized the truth I stated above, trials are blessings from God that He gives to His closest friends. Material possessions and easy lives may seem like blessings, but usually the people on the recieving end have very shallow, self centered and immature faiths. Most people like this give Christianity and our faith a bad name. How can you be Christ’s true friend if you never shared in his suffering? This is why The Bible also says many will say “Lord, Lord, let us in”. And He will reply “Go away, I never knew you”. It’s not that material possessions and wealth are in and of themselves bad, it’s the attitude that many people, including Christians have when they say “I’m so #blessed 🙏” . . . they give lip service, but don’t actually have the attitude of humility and live knowing that every thing that have is from God, they didn’t do it on their own or just have good luck. The bright side of trials though is that God will always always always bring us out of them eventually and like Job He will very often replace what we’ve lost and then some and bless us temporally and spiritually here on Earth and even more in Heaven. People who get things easy don’t save up those blessings in Heaven and don’t appreciate what they have as much either.

And if we pray for happiness and healing in this life and dont receive it, I guarantee those individuals are receiving even more in Heaven for it. That is the only way I have ever been able to reconcile unanswered prayers, poverty, injustice, and suffering with God’s goodness and love. Afterall, God is a father and how could a good father allow His children to suffer for no good reason and still be good?
 
To po18guy: Your answer was my first reason conclusion after I read the OP. I admire much of the answers on this post because it comes from understanding.

To GEddie: It is true that temporal happiness is not the true desire of hope.

To fhansen: You spoke of the promised land. We find this exodus ideal typologic in the mind of Christ by the preaching of His beatitudes. And you’re right, “regardless of our background” God gave all in the drama of salvation.

Regarding with pianistclare: savourest the divine things (cf. Mt 16:23) to your utmost and the answers with flick on like a light switch, as S. John says, “And as for you, let the unction, which you have received from him, abide in you. And you have no need that any man teach you; but as his unction teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie. And as it hath taught you, abide in him.” (1 Jn 2:27)

To TK421: I am still looking for the conclusive answer of what you brought up. For it says, “I love them that love me: and they that in the morning early watch for me, shall find me.” (Prov 8:17)
“God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” (Jas 4:6, 1 Pet 5:5, Prov 3:34 Lxx) And S. Bonaventure said S. Augustine says in the last of his explanation on humility, “If all things were equal, all things would not exist.” (Disputed Questions on Evangelical Perfection, q. 1)

To Monica4316: Others answered with understanding and wisdom. You did as well.

Regarding with Bataar: Keeping in mind Solomon’s petition. (cf. 2 Chronicles 1:10) No one striving for the contrite heart can go wrong in that desire.

Regarding with Vico: How long Lord until you come? “teach us to number our days, that we may get us a heart of wisdom.” (Ps 90:12)

Monte_RCMS: In savourest, the divine things those are the acts for religion.

To donegan09: How is your understanding different than the other answers? Maybe it is not, for it is the same faith. Correct?
 
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It is by seeking God’s Will first in all things that we arrive at temporal happiness as a sort of by product: "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." (Matthew Chapter 6)
…and it works for sure!..

We are created for God and it is only in God that we find our happiness here on earth and in our Hope for Heaven “Our souls are restless, Lord, until they rest in Thee” (St Augustine)
 
The book of Job kind of shows me he only cares about the latter.
 
You are in a great deal of pain right now. I’m so sorry.
Take this for what it’s worth.
When my dreams wholesale collapsed around me, I was brought to realize that our endgame as Christians is salvation, not earthly things.
I realized that I needed to develop a Christian dis-interest, and keep my eyes on Jesus alone, and to live in service to others, and leave the outcome in His hands.
That said, it’s a struggle for me, every day, because I’m still very attached to the things of this world, but I have peace when I keep my eyes on Him, the way Peter did when he walked across the water to our Lord. When I focus on my own wants, I sink.
We’re only human, we’re going to get mired in our own wants sometimes, but it’s been something to strive towards.
Try reading “Abandonment to Divine Providence” by Jean Pierre de Caussade.
 
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