Suffering - Our Human Situation........article

[BarbaraTherese]

“Suffering - Our Human Situation”
http://spiritualorientations.com/Human Suffering.htm

Below is quoted only a small text of the overall article on the above link…

…"…Another response is to pray frantically that God will get us out of this mess. We even feel a barely suppressed sense of outrage that, since God has got us into it in the first place, God will get us out. So we expect a miracle and when the miracle fails to happen, we feel that God has failed to take care of us: “God, you let us down. Get us away from this nasty reality. Hide us.” It doesn’t occur to us that we are just using God as another form of denial.

How can we sneer at these responses? Who knows how we will respond when the hour strikes? Surely God is our refuge, and it is our right to ask for the agony to pass. Even Jesus did that! Did Jesus not pray that his cup might pass? – Yes, he did, but in redeeming humility, he added, “Abba, if it be possible … not my will but yours” (Lk 22:42). Our tragedy is not that we suffer, but that we waste suffering. Self-pity, turned inward, warps us and drives out love. In refusing to face our situation as it is, we run from the truth – and from ourselves. If we are in flight from ourselves, we have nothing whatever to give to others except our own barrenness. We can only gain from suffering if we use the opportunity to grow in compassion and understanding, to become more sensitive to the needs of others. “Help carry one another’s burdens; in that way you will fulfill the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2). Through suffering, God is offering us a share in the life that God chose for God’s Word who became human…"…