There may be information, on the forum, addressing redemptive suffering,
and perhaps another poster could note same.
I am not a Christian, yet I am familiar with Catholic theology.
If I could feel better, offering up my suffering, then I wouldn’t be in profound suffering.
Aching loss, lifelong illness, a difficult childhood - are not undone, emotionally,
by offering this suffering to God, in union with Christ’s own suffering.
In fact, Jesus cried out on the cross “Why have You forsaken me?”
The human emotions of Jesus are expressed, here.
He didn’t feel better, emotionally, offering his sense of abandonment by his Father.
He was offering the perfect sacrifice, according to Christian theology.
Yet St. Paul says:
Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up
what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church…
Colossians 1: 24
This has been variously interpreted, but I see this as a reference to the fact that Jesus,
in his earthly life, could not possibly have endured all the different sufferings that are
the lot of mankind. He could not experience lifelong physical illness, nor mental illness.
He could not know what it is to have lost a child, or a beloved spouse.
He never lived in great poverty. He never had to contend with the losses one may face
as one ages.
Even though he said that “…the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head…” he did not
sleep on a subway grate, in a northeast winter.
So I figure that Catholicism teaches that - whatever one endures, may be offered to God
- in union with that of the sufferings of Jesus.
Yet what is puzzling, about Paul’s observation, is that elsewhere, in his writings,
he is at pains to point out that Jesus is to be considered the perfect offering, once for all.
But maybe a Christian poster could address this point.
Best wishes,
reen12
