The Saints on Suffering

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Almost everyone I know suffers from time to time - both physically and mentally. During my search for understanding the purpose of suffering and I have found great comfort in writings from the saints.

So, I would like this thread to be what the Saints say about suffering. I would prefer that this thread is not used to debate or express personal opinions - just quotes from the saints - or maybe a comment saying you like a particular post. If you don’t know the exact quote, please paraphrase as closely as possible and maybe someone else can post the actual quote.

For example,
From St Faustina’s Diary - 343
I thank You, Jesus, You who first drank the cup of bitterness before You gave it to me, in a much milder form. I put my lips to this cup of Your holy will. Let all be done according to Your good pleasure; let that which Your wisdom ordained before the ages be done to me. I want to drink the cup to its last drop, and not seek to know the reason why. In bitterness is my joy, in hopelessness is my trust. In You, O Lord, all is good, all is a gift of Your paternal Heart. I do not prefer consolations, but thank You, O Jesus, for everything! It is my delight to fix my gaze upon You, O mysterious dwelling places, and ther I am at home. I know very well the dwelling place of my Spouse. I feel there is not a single drop of blood in me that does not burn with love for You.
 
St John Vianney:
Whether we will or not, we must suffer. There are some who suffer like the good thief, and others like the bad thief. They both suffered equally. But one knew how to make his sufferings meritorious, he accepted them in the spirit of reparation, and turning towards Jesus crucified, he received from His mouth these beautiful words: "This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise. " The other, on the contrary, cried out, uttered imprecations and blasphemies, and expired in the most frightful despair. There are two ways of suffering – to suffer with love, and to suffer without love. The saints suffered everything with joy, patience, and perseverance, because they loved. As for us, we suffer with anger, vexation, and weariness, because we do not love. If we loved God, we should love crosses, we should wish for them, we should take pleasure in them. . . . We should be happy to be able to suffer for the love of Him who lovingly suffered for us. Of what do we complain? Alas! the poor infidels, who have not the happiness of knowing God and His infinite loveliness, have the same crosses that we have; but they have not the same consolations. You say it is hard? No, it is easy, it is consoling, it is sweet; it is happiness. Only we must love while we suffer, and suffer while we love.
 
**St. Augustine:
“Our pilgrimage on earth cannot be exempt from trial. We progress by means of trial. No one knows himself except through trial, or recieve a crown except after a victory, or strives except against an enemy or temptations.” **
 
Padre Pio: You should feel at home with sufferings that it pleases Jesus to send you, since you always have to live with them. Acting thus you think less of being freed from them. Jesus who cannot suffer long to keep you in affliction will come to relieve and comfort you by infusing fresh courage into your soul.

From St. Pio - - Novena and prayers
 
From a Letter of Saint Raymond of Penyafort (1175-1275)
May the God of love and peace set your hearts at rest.
The preacher of God’s truth has told us that all who want to live righteously in Christ will suffer persecution. If he spoke the truth and did not lie, the only exception to this general statement is, I think, the person who either neglects, or does not know how, to live temperately, justly and righteously in this world.
May you never be numbered among those whose house is peaceful, quiet and free from care; those on who the Lord’s chastisement does not descend; those who live out their days in prosperity, and in the twinkling of an eye will go down to hell.
Your purity of life, your devotion, deserve and call for a reward; because you are acceptable and pleasing to God your purity of life must be made purer still, by frequent buffetings, until you attain perfect sincerity of heart. If from time to time you feel the sword falling on you with double or treble force, this also should be seen as sheer joy and the mark of love.
The two-edged sword consists in conflict without, fears within. It falls with double or treble force within, when the cunning spirit troubles the depths of your heart with guile and enticements. You have learned enough already about these kinds of warfare, or you would not have been able to enjoy peace and interior tranquility in all its beauty.
The sword falls with double and treble force externally when, without cause being given, there breaks out from within the Church persecution in spiritual matters, where wounds are more serious, especially when inflicted by friends.
This is that inevitable and blessed cross of Christ which Andrew, that manly saint, received with joyful heart: the cross in which alone we must make our boast, as Paul, God’s chosen instrument, has told us.
Look then on Jesus, the author and preserver of faith: in complete sinlessness he suffered, and at the hands of those who were his own, and was numbered among the wicked. As you drink the cup of the Lord Jesus (how glorious it is!), give thanks to the Lord, the giver of all blessings.
May the God of love and peace set your hearts at rest and speed you on your journey; may he meanwhile shelter you from disturbance by others in the hidden recesses of his love, until he brings you at last into that place of complete plentitude where you will repose forever in the vision of peace, in the security of trust and in the restful enjoyment of his riches.
 
May you never be numbered among those whose house is peaceful, quiet and free from care; those on who the Lord’s chastisement does not descend; those who live out their days in prosperity, and in the twinkling of an eye will go down to hell.
Worth remembering when you see people living lives like this.

‘You must either suffer in this life or give up the hope of seeing God in Heaven. Sufferings and persecutions are of the greatest avail to us, because we can find therein a very efficient means to make atonement for our sins, since we are bound to suffer for them either in this world or in the next.’

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars
 
St Therese of The Child Jesus:
All thanks to Thee, Most Loving Lord,
For helping me to see
That every tear and every sigh
Can purchase souls for Thee!
The days so dark with bitterness,
The nights with pain so cold,
May, they, by thy power,
Be changed to Coins of Gold
If I but give Thee every hour,
Of suffering and care,
How many souls eternally,
May in Thy glory share?
To purchase souls! With Thine aid,
My life’s one goal shall be,
To give and give, and ever give,
Until Eternity!
 
St. Madeline Sophie Barat:
“As iron is fashioned by fire and on the anvil, so in the fire of suffering and under the weight of trials, our souls receive that form which our Lord desires them to have.”
 
My suffering brought me to the Catholic Church. I was costing in mediocrity and wading in sin, though I didn’t think of myself then as a bad person. I believed in God, and knew at least at some level, that I could or would be held accountable.

I guess I have 'offered up" my pain, and while it seems as if my emotional and financial pain has temporarily abated, my physical pain is still going strong. If that is what it will take to keep me focused and on the right path, then I accept that cross. I do hope though, that one day that pain to will abate or go away for good, but if that comes at the cost of “going back out into the desert,” or to forget about God and prayer, then I just as soon keep that pain, though as I write this, it is only a few notches away from being unbearable.

I am ready though, not to be financially poor anymore. I don’t care to be rich, I just want to be able to pay my bills, eat, and save for future emergencies, and have something to give to God’s church.
 
  • A young girl inquired if the misfortunes that befell her family were divine punishments. “No,” replied Father Paul [Fr. Paul of Moll, “Benedictine Wonderworker”], “they are trials which the good God sends in order to make you a little more like Him.” Thereupon the girl asked what would come of her. “An angel in Heaven,” he said.
“O what inspiration there is in the Crucifix! Who could find it hard to persevere at the sight of a God who never commands us to do anything which he has not first practiced himself?” – St. John Vianney

“The Lord is equally kind when He apportions affliction as when He gives consolations.” - St. Francis de Sales

“It would be like blasphemy to believe that God is indifferent to our needs and sufferings. God always looks upon us with an infinite look, one that is infinitely intense, penetrating to the very depths of our soul and knowing all its griefs and its needs.” - Bl. Dom Columba Marmion

“The Cross is the way to Paradise, but only when it is borne willingly.” - St. Paul of the Cross

“Bearing physical and spiritual ailments is the worthiest gift we can offer to Jesus.” – St. Pio of Pietrelcina

“When anything disagreeable happens, remember it comes from God, and say at once, “This comes from God”, and be at peace.” - St. Alphonsus Liguori

“If one could understand the value of an act of love for God in suffering, one would experience the greatest grief at being obliged to pass a single moment without being able to make this meritorious act. Happy is he who, in suffering, makes acts of love!” - Fr. Paul of Moll

I could add many, many more 🙂
 
I could add many, many more 🙂
👍 Please do.

I also really enjoyed these ones -
littlestsouls2 said:
Embrace the cross lovingly, whenever it comes, as the most precious token of love I can give you in this life.” (Jesus to St. Margaret Mary)

“Help Me, My daughter, to save souls. Join your sufferings to My Passion and offer them to the Heavenly Father for sinners.” (Jesus to St. Faustina)

“When suffering is accepted with love, it is no longer suffering, but it is changed into joy.” (St. Therese)

🙂
Especially the last one by St. Therese

The quotes about ‘desiring’ the cross scare me a bit, I want to desire it, but not yet. 🙂

I especially like the ones though, that, should a heavy cross befall me, I will have the strength and know how to carry it. 👍

God Bless

Thank you for reading
Josh
 
“Satan may appear in many disguises like Christ, but Satan never has and never will appear with scars. Only Heaven’s Love can show the marks of love’s greatest gift.” - Bishop Fulton J. Sheen

In regards to suffering I believe Christ is never more closer, than to those who experience pain and suffering, who remain next to him on the Corss and endure his same Cross for love’s sake.

I also really liked these extracts out of the booklets linked below -
Extract from the book From Sinai to Calvary:
From Sinai to Calvary - loveandmercy.org/Eng-FSC-Reg.pdf

you can see and understand with greater ease, why human suffering makes sense when it is endured for love’s sake, desiring to fulfill the Divine Will. And it is that the greatest pain, as intense as it may be, does not diminish the joy in the heart of those who sweeten themselves with the greatest Love.
Extract from the book From Sinai to Calvary:
From Sinai to Calvary - loveandmercy.org/Eng-FSC-Reg.pdf

**6) “It is precisely because of that boundless love which, in the midst of My unfathomable suffering, I did not lose confidence in My Father. But rather, I was being overcome by immense joy in knowing that I was fulfilling His Will and, thus, demonstrating My Love for Him and for all mankind.” **
I have thoroughly enjoyed these short booklets -

Booklets on the Passion
The Passion - loveandmercy.org/Eng-TP-Reg.pdf
The Stations of The Cross - loveandmercy.org/Eng-SOC-Reg.pdf
From Sinai to Calvary - loveandmercy.org/Eng-FSC-Reg.pdf
I Have Given My Life for You - loveandmercy.org/Eng-IHG-Reg.pdf

(they all contain the Roman Catholic Imprimatur which assures the reader that nothing therein is contrary to Catholic faith, morals or teachings, for more information regarding them, please read this - youshallbelieve.com/A-plea-to-humanity.pdf).

I hope I have helped all those who may come here looking for help in carrying their crosses.

God Bless

Thank you for reading
Josh
 
👍 Please do.
Okay 🙂 Here are a few more:

“The best penance is to have patience with the sorrows God permits.” – St. Peter Damian

“If one could understand the value of an act of love for God in suffering, one would experience the greatest grief at being obliged to pass a single moment without being able to make this meritorious act. Happy is he who, in suffering, makes acts of love!” - Fr. Paul of Moll

“The cross is the greatest gift God could bestow on His Elect on earth. There is nothing so necessary, so beneficial, so sweet, or so glorious as to suffer something for Jesus. If you suffer as you ought, the cross will become a precious yoke that Jesus will carry with you.” - St. Louis de Montfort

“Let us understand that God is a physician, and that suffering is a medicine for salvation, not a punishment for damnation.” – St. Augustine

“One must not think that a person who is suffering is not praying. He is offering up his sufferings to God, and many a time he is praying much more truly than one who goes away by himself and meditates his head off, and, if he has squeezed out a few tears, thinks that is prayer.” – St. Teresa of Avila

“If the angels could desire anything, it seems to me that they would envy us our privilege of suffering…” – Bl. Dina Belanger

“To suffer and not to suffer for God is torment.” – St. Gerard Majella

“Difficulties and sufferings will disappear, but the merit we acquire through our fidelity will remain forever.” – St. Jane Frances de Chantal

“Let us strive to face suffering with Christian courage. Then all difficulties will vanish and pain itself will become transformed into joy.” – St. Teresa of Avila

“Let us tell ourselves that every day, every hour, every instant of suffering borne with Jesus and for love of Him will be a new heaven for all eternity, and a new glory given God for ever.” – Bl. Dom Columba Marmion

This last one is much longer, but it is well worth the read!

“We are indebted to God’s justice for a hundred thousand bushels of wheat; and he lets us off for a portion of it. O great favour! We merit eternal torments, and he lets us suffer a few small temporal afflictions. Ah, what goodness! We should take care to make good use of our afflictions. God wants to cleanse us of the filth of our sins by a lye-bath of suffering that seems very strong. But the stronger it is, the more it whitens us. It makes us pleasing in the sight of his divine majesty, provided that we cultivate the necessary dispositions, chiefly these four:
First, we must accept our sufferings from the most adorable Trinity, and not attribute them in any way to our fellow creatures. They are merely the rods our Father uses to punish us.
Second, we must humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, regarding ourselves not as innocent, but as guilty criminals. The humbler we become, the more will God protect us and convert all things to our welfare.
Third, we regard sin as the sole author of all our ills, turning all our hatred against this monstrous enemy. We must forcefully destroy sin by true penitence and banish it beyond the doors of our souls. Let’s remove the cause, and the effect will cease.
Fourth, we must guard against subscribing to the pagan sentiment of hating those who hate us. We must follow Jesus, our gentle leader, by loving all- including enemies.” – St. John Eudes
 
St. Thomas More, from his “Dialogue of Comfort in a Time of Tribulation:”

“If we lay first, for a sure ground, a very fast faith, whereby we believe to be true all that the scripture saith (understood truly, as the old holy doctors declare it and as the spirit of God instructeth his Catholic church), then shall we consider tribulation as a gracious gift of God, a gift that he specially gave his special friends; a thing that in scripture is highly commended and praised; a thing of which the contrary, long continued, is perilous; a thing which, if God send it not, men have need to put upon themselves and seek by penance; a thing that helpeth to purge our past sins; a thing that preserveth us from sins that otherwise would come; a thing that causeth us to set less by the world; a thing that much diminisheth our pains in purgatory; a thing that much increaseth our final reward in heaven; the thing with which all his apostles followed him thither; the thing to which our Saviour exhorteth all men; the thing without which he saith we be not his disciples; the thing without which no man can get to heaven.”
 
St. Francis de Sales, “Your Cross:”

“The everlasting God has in His wisdom foreseen from eternity the cross that He now presents to you as a gift from His inmost heart. This cross He now sends you He has considered with His all-knowing eyes, understood with His divine mind, tested with His wise justice, warmed with loving arms and weighed with His own hands to see that it be not one inch too large and not one ounce too heavy for you. He has blessed it with His holy Name, anointed it with His consolation, taken one last glance at you and your courage, and then sent it to you from heaven, a special greeting from God to you, an alms of the all-merciful love of God.”
 
St. Thomas More, from his “Dialogue of Comfort in a Time of Tribulation:”

“If we lay first, for a sure ground, a very fast faith, whereby we believe to be true all that the scripture saith (understood truly, as the old holy doctors declare it and as the spirit of God instructeth his Catholic church), then shall we consider tribulation as a gracious gift of God, a gift that he specially gave his special friends; a thing that in scripture is highly commended and praised; a thing of which the contrary, long continued, is perilous; a thing which, if God send it not, men have need to put upon themselves and seek by penance; a thing that helpeth to purge our past sins; a thing that preserveth us from sins that otherwise would come; a thing that causeth us to set less by the world; a thing that much diminisheth our pains in purgatory; a thing that much increaseth our final reward in heaven; the thing with which all his apostles followed him thither; the thing to which our Saviour exhorteth all men; the thing without which he saith we be not his disciples; the thing without which no man can get to heaven.”
St. Thomas More does a fine job describing all the benefits of tribulations.
 
The road is narrow. He who wishes to travel it more easily must cast off all things and use the cross as his cane. In other words, he must be truly resolved to suffer willingly for the love of God in all things.
–St. John of the Cross

One must not think that a person who is suffering is not praying. He is offering up his sufferings to God, and many a time he is praying much
more truly than one who goes away by himself and meditates his head off, and, if he has squeezed out a few tears, thinks that is prayer.
–St. Teresa of Avila

Blessed be He, Who came into the world for no other purpose than to suffer.
–St. Teresa of Avila

whitelilyoftrinity.com/saints_quotes_suffering.html

Peace
 
O my Lord Jesu, I believe, and by Thy grace will ever believe and hold, and I know that it is true, and will be true to the end of the world, that nothing great is done without suffering, without humiliation, and that all things are possible by means of it. I believe, O my God, that poverty is better than riches, pain better than pleasure, obscurity and contempt than name, and ignominy and reproach than honour. My Lord, I do not ask Thee to bring these trials on me, for I know not if I could face them; but at least, O Lord, whether I be in prosperity or adversity, I will believe that it is as I have said. I will never have faith in riches, rank, power, or reputation. I will never set my heart on worldly success or on worldly advantages. I will never wish for what men call the prizes of life. I will ever, with Thy grace, make much of those who are despised or neglected, honour the poor, revere the suffering, and admire and venerate Thy saints and confessors, and take my part with them in spite of the world.

And lastly, O my dear Lord, though I am so very weak that I am not fit to ask Thee for suffering as a gift, and have not strength to do so, at least I will beg of Thee grace to meet suffering well, when Thou in Thy love and wisdom dost bring it upon me. Let me bear pain, reproach, disappointment, slander, anxiety, suspense, as Thou wouldest have me, O my Jesu, and as Thou by Thy own suffering hast taught me, when it comes. And I promise too, with Thy grace, that I will never set myself up, never seek pre-eminence, never court any great thing of the world, never prefer myself to others. I wish to bear insult meekly, and to return good for evil. I wish to humble myself in all things, and to be silent when I am ill-used, and to be patient when sorrow or pain is prolonged, and all for the love of Thee, and Thy Cross, knowing that in this way I shall gain the promise both of this life and of the next.

Blessed John Henry Newman: Meditations and Devotions: V. The Power of the Cross.

newmanreader.org/works/meditations/meditations10.html#doctrine5
 
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