How does "offering it up" work?

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Hey y’all,

I was on another thread, where a woman was talking about offering up her suffering during labor for the conversion of souls, and it got me thinking…

…I understand how I can offer up graces given to me during Mass or throughout my day for various causes, conversion of sinners, the holy souls in Purgatory, etc., but I need help wrapping my mind around offering up my suffering.

I know that by doing so, I’m uniting my suffering with the suffering of Our Lord on the Cross- is that how it works? Since Jesus died for all souls, to become the bridge between human and God, by uniting my suffering with His, I’m helping, somehow, in that work? How?

It’s so frustrating. Every time I think I’ve got my mind wrapped about it, I lose it. How can my suffering help, say, my mother and father undergo a conversion of the heart?

Please help. Baby no. three’s coming soon (no matter how much it doesn’t seem so :rolleyes: ), and I’d love to be able to help out other souls while laboring to bring my new son into the world.

Thanks so much!
Cari
 
Don’t sweat it. You’re following Christs example to be selfless even at a time of pain for yourself. That’s how I look at it.

This practice is great. It makes “hard things” seem nothing at all.
 
I was recently in an accident, where I broke both of my legs below the knee. While I was being light-flighted to the hospital, for the first time in my life, I offered up my suffering to God. Like you, I didn’t know how to do it, or even what it meant to me.

But, I immediately got a sense of peace and warmth. I knew that my pain would be over soon and that it was all going to be all right.

I’ll never understand it completely, but I surely won’t hesitate to do it again.
 
Just as praying for people brings graces to them, so does your suffering. When you suffer with the patience of Christ, it is like a living prayer. A good time to make your spiritual offering, is at Mass during the offertory. Prayerfully unite your offerings to the Sacrifice that will be made present on the altar and offered to the Father 🙂
 
pray the Morning Offering or St. Francis’ Prayer before the Crucifix, which both put this into words, until such time as you are able to express this desire you unite your sufferings with Christs in your own prayer.

We discussed Dr. DAvid Jeremiah, an evangelical radio preacher on this board a while back, and last night he gave a terrific bible study on this topic, using some passages in Ephesians and Phillipians. Not for the first time, he sounded so “Catholic” I was astounded. He made the point that “we” meaning I suppose other evangelicals, shy away from the suffering aspect of Christ and do not emphasize the value and necessity of uniting our sufferings in this world with those of Christ, and thereby fully appeciating and benefiting from the whole meaning of His sacrifice. I believe the show was taped before the shootings in VA, but an editorial announcement before his program played did make the connection.
 
I was recently going to call into Catholic Answers Live to ask Rosalind Moss this very question!

I would really like to have a definite answer. Lately I have been “offering up” much of my own personal depression and suffering, and for the first time in my life I am starting to feel a sense of a spiritual connection with Christ.

Nonetheless, I would really like to understand this better, to understand what it is I am doing and why it is a good thing to do. On the surface, it doesn’t make sense to offer my pain and suffering up to God. Pain and suffering sucks. I would want only to offer GOOD things to God, not bad things. But I know this makes sense somehow.

I was recently reading about the biography of Mother Angelica and did not realize how much physical pain and suffering she has experienced in her life. And she offers all of it up.

I kind of understand it this way: Offering up my pain and suffering to Christ is a way of giving thanks for the cross I am bearing, and for the opportunity to be purified and united with Him. I don’t know if that’s right or not.
 
I’ve been wondering this very thing recently. Something else, too…I’ve only been Catholic for a little over a year, there was some pretty intense suffering that I went through in my younger days…since God is outside of time, is it possible for me to offer up suffering that I went through then, retroactively, for souls in Purgatory?
 
Cari,
It’s taken me a few years to really get a grip on this as well. Despite the fact that I am a Pre Vat2 cradle and was raised in an Italian home where the phrase “offer it up” was uttered every ten minutes, I really did not understand it until the last year.

I have a chronic physical condition which causes me daily pain. God has given me ample opportunity to use this suffering as a sacrifice for the redemption of souls. I try to model my offering after Christ, whose agony in the Garden was a combination of great sadness and complete acceptance of the Father’s will. Knowing that His death would throw open the gates of heaven and provide forgiveness of sins, He was able to fulfill His mission. If I can use my tiny, insignificant bit of pain in the same way, and offer it as a prayer to the Father for His mercy on the souls who are lost, I am more than willing to suffer. Often, I will think of one or two particular family members who are so far astray and imagine that my offering might invite God’s mercy and grace into their hearts. It gives me a great sense of peace and joy and reminds me of the enormous sacrifice our Lord paid for us.
 
**“Offering it up” is a timely topic for me, and I could certainly benefit from a remedial “course” on the topic before venturing into “offering it up 101.”

Two months ago I fell on ice which created severe nerve pain on my upper left side. I thought I had experienced pain but nothing like this. Spinal shots have helped, but I now face neck surgery.

During my sleepless nights I have read about suffering from a number of books, but still do not grasp concretely what a Catholic understanding of “offering it up” means and how one goes about it.

I look forward to your “teachings” about this important topic.

jblair
**
 
Thank you all for sharing your insights and stories. It is helping me a bit, to understand how uniting my suffering with Our Lord’s becomes, in a way, a prayer. And any graces God bestows in response to that prayer can be applied to the conversion of sinners, the holy souls in Purgatory, peace on Earth, etc.

It’s kinda sorta the same thing with my housework (stay-at-homeschooling expectant mother of soon to be 3 here), I’m learning that I can offer it up as a prayer of obedience (I tend to “keep” more of those graces for myself, as I find I really, REALLY need them toward the end of the day 😛 ). I just need to remember to do that- I forget. :rolleyes:

But, as a child, going to a very very spiritually dry Presbyterian church, I was taught that “prayer” was limited to speaking (not even listening, really) to God. It wasn’t until I was much older that I came across the concept of prayer being more than just words.

Thanks again, all! Keep the insights coming!
Cari
 
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