Unjust How to Deal

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Nap66

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When God seems unjust to you in your life, how do you deal with it?
 
I remind myself that i should accept my suffering as Christ accepted His sufferings and injustices.

I watch this video as well when times are especially bad by Ven. Sheen (May he be cannonized soon).

I think of the suffering of Our Blessed Mother.

The Dark Night of the Soul Read in 50 Parts:


And pray/meditate/think of the ways ive been unjust to others in life.

Also…reading about the Saints gives me strength.

Praying for u.
 
Let us first accept that nothing God does is unjust, that we are the unjust and that when we sin it is both against God and against our neighbor specifically referring to sinning as an injustice. Sin is an attack on both Divine Justice and Social Justice. Next let us ask God for the grace to understand that the allowance of evil and result of sin comes to three main points, that calamity and evil in this world are allowed by God for the following three ends…
  1. That we may be sanctified
  2. That those close to us may be sacrificed
  3. That God may be Glorified
We see these theee ends come to fruition in both the Old and New Testaments. Pax Christi!
 
I would like to say I handled it all saintly-like, but the fact is I I’ve thrown my share of spiritual tantrums and been to where I’ve looked despair right in the face.
I’m very fond of the book “Abandonment to Divine Providence”, it’s gotten me through.
Also, faithfulness to confession and communion, even when I wasn’t feeling it.
I’ve confessed my spiritual darkness, too in confession.
Pray, even when you don’t feel like it.
I’ve also trained myself to thank God for other people’s good fortune.
And I don’t turnabout instantly, either. The spiritual life is the work of a lifetime.
:pray:t2::pray:t2::pray:t2:
 
Thanks everyone for your experiences and advice. It’s hard to keep going sometimes when God seems to bless others who clearly break the Ten Commandments every day. I know he has a “master plan” that we are not privy to, but as mere mortals it’s hard to stay on the right path when the wrong path seems to be rewarded so much more here on earth.

I just keep reminding myself that we are living for the next world, not this one.
 
How do you know it’s God and not just people pushing around their own will and getting what they want out of life?
I don’t remember any of the Saints being rewarded any of the stuff people are so happy with today. Including emotional accomplishment. Some of the Saints were married, maybe happy, they died for Him anyway. The world - as in people - wants one thing, God told us to not be guided by them. He said “even if you are in this world, you are not from this world.”
I don’t think the people you are referring to are being rewarded by anyone. They are just the temporary “winners” of the world.
I am miserable sometimes, but apart from silly stuff there is not one other life I would actually want for myself. There is always something we don’t know in anyone’s life. Maybe even sufferance we don’t know about.
 
Mary888 said:
I don’t think the people you are referring to are being rewarded by anyone. They are just the temporary “winners” of the world.

I am miserable sometimes, but apart from silly stuff there is not one other life I would actually want for myself. There is always something we don’t know in anyone’s life. Maybe even sufferance we don’t know about.
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That’s true. Most people suffer in some way, some people more than others though. I was thinking about this topic and wondered why this world seems to reward evil and badness. Then when I was saying my rosary and meditating on the Transfiguration, God put a thought to me and said “good will ALWAYS win in the end.” Even though Jesus was to go through the evil, worst time where humans would believe that he was crushed by the evil in the world, Jesus showed his disciples that good would prevail in the end through his Transfiguration. Then God said to me “do you want to be on the side of good, and be assured of prevailing in the end, or on the side of evil which is destined to crushed by the good.” Well of course I chose good!

This world is unjust, God is not. Good always prevails, always - if not in this world, then guaranteed in the next.
 
Yes I believe this too.
I think it’s harder to be good and the resist the world today because for decades the idea of “being a winner and not a loser” has been instilled in the common subconsciousness. What game is fun when every time you play it, you have to win? And people more competitive than me have a harder time realizing this.
Certain saints claim that beauty, health, wealth, are not always good for finding someone find redemption. Even though there are saints who had all of these and these gifts did not impeach their connection with Christ in the end. But it is all temporary like you said. And I take it as a sign and lesson even for the believers to question ourselves again if Heaven really means being pretty, healthy, wealthy or are these reflections of our own human limitations… after the fall? But Jesus did use material references in his teachings, however He said “one day I will no longer speak in metaphors to you.” So I understand that His words are to be interpreted metaphorically until that day comes.
 
All this ignores what happens to non-humans who are treated unjustly. Darwin famous said that no benevolent God would create a wasp that would plant eggs into caterpillars and kill then slowly, by eating them from the inside.Unjust treatment of humans always has an answer. Unjust treatment of other beings does not. It is the greatest flaw in Catholic thought; it has no rational answer.
 
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Fairness. Justice. Equality. Goals, certainly, but to live under such conditions would most certainly weaken us. Think about this: If life was fair, everyone would have cancer, instead of just a few. All would share dread diseases, not just a few. All would have birth defects. Now that’s fairness. I for one, am thankful that life is not fair.

It is the unfairness that requires love to stand in the gap. We are better for deciding to bridge that gap; for deciding to love. We are most Christ-like when we do.
 
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“We know that all things work for good for those who love God” (Rom. 8:28).

Sometimes it’s hard for us to see the big picture that God sees (seeing as He is omniscient and all good and we are not). It’s like when I was a little kid, it seemed unjust to me that I had to get shots at the doctor’s office, or eat vegetables instead of candy, or that I couldn’t just have every toy I wanted, etc. Now I see how those things actually worked for my good. Likewise, when we see as God sees, we will see how all the hardships we faced in life ultimately worked for our good.

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.
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FiveLinden said:
All this ignores what happens to non-humans who are treated unjustly. Darwin famous said that no benevolent God would create a wasp that would plant eggs into caterpillars and kill then slowly, by eating them from the inside.Unjust treatment of humans always has an answer. Unjust treatment of other beings does not. It is the greatest flaw in Catholic thought; it has no rational answer.
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I see no one wants to engage with me on this.
 
Unjust treatment of animals and other things on the earth. The only answer I have is that God said man was to hold dominion over all things on earth. So if God creates that wasp that kills that caterpillar it must have a reason that benefits man. All things/animals on earth benefit man even if it seems unjust. Just my opinion.
 
Nap66 said:
Unjust treatment of animals and other things on the earth. The only answer I have is that God said man was to hold dominion over all things on earth. So if God creates that wasp that kills that caterpillar it must have a reason that benefits man. All things/animals on earth benefit man even if it seems unjust. Just my opinion
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Thanks for responding. You won’t be surprised that I don’t find the ‘dominion’ argument compelling. It seems to me that this argument strikes at the very concept of a good God, and has no answer, other than that there is not a good God. The natural order of things is for virtually all creatures to die in fear and pain, in most cases long before the end of their natural lifespan. Humans, on the whole, are now better off than other species in this regard. As it is claimed to be humans who introduced original sin how can this be explained? The lack of responses apart from Nap66 further illustrates the strength of this argument.
 
FiveLinden said:
The natural order of things is for virtually all creatures to die in fear and pain, in most cases long before the end of their natural lifespan.
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A case of anthropomorphism, or attributing human emotion to animal/insect life. The natural order keeps everything in balance. For instance (and I can’t prove this because I’ve never had a conversation with a wasp or caterpillar) but the process you cite of the wasp and catepillar just might be designed by God/nature to control the number of caterpillars to keep the balance of nature. Absent man from existence as we know it on this planet, and all nature would be in perfect balance. Animals kill, not out of anger or wrath (or a desire to inflict pain) but rather by instinct to address natural causes (hunger, protection, etc.)
Giving animals human characteristics is only for the Saturday morning cartoons.
 
FiveLinden said:
The natural order of things is for virtually all creatures to die in fear and pain, in most cases long before the end of their natural lifespan.
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Well, not every thing is going to live to the exact age statistically of a natural lifespan and if most creatures die young then statistically their natural lifespan is short and they die at their natural lifespan. Yes, most creatures live a life of predator and prey, that is the order of nature and that is so because we all have to eat. Why would a good God create that world? Who knows? Truly, I don’t have a clue. If it was my world I think I would have created it a bit differently. But it’s not my world, or yours unfortunately. For all I know everything is truly just and will be revealed in the next life. What happens here matters in the next, and that includes animals and insects. How? We will find out when we get there and if there is nothing on the “other side” then does it matter at all about justness and a good God? Nope.
 
joeybaggz said:
A case of anthropomorphism, or attributing human emotion to animal/insect life. The natural order keeps everything in balance. For instance (and I can’t prove this because I’ve never had a conversation with a wasp or caterpillar) but the process you cite of the wasp and catepillar just might be designed by God/nature to control the number of caterpillars to keep the balance of nature. Absent man from existence as we know it on this planet, and all nature would be in perfect balance. Animals kill, not out of anger or wrath (or a desire to inflict pain) but rather by instinct to address natural causes (hunger, protection, etc.)

Giving animals human characteristics is only for the Saturday morning cartoons
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Animals can feel pain and distress. There is plenty of research that demonstrates this. Just Google it. As the Church teaches animals do not have eternal life, there can be no recompense for this in the hereafter. The Church and the Bible teach that this was a result of Original Sin. God, therefore is responsible for creating a system in which pain and suffering is caused to innocent animals. This ‘problem of pain’ is not resolved by saying ‘God must know what he is doing’. God clearly either does know, and is causing suffering to the innocent, or doesn’t and is therefore not God. This is the greatest challenge, in my view, to Christian belief.
 
Nap66 said:
. What happens here matters in the next, and that includes animals and insects. How? We will find out when we get there and if there is nothing on the “other side” then does it matter at all about justness and a good God? Nope.
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If someone is killed, then God can raise them up to a greater good life after death. If there is no God and no after life, then people who suffer injustice on this earth, will never have it put right.
 
FiveLinden said:
All this ignores what happens to non-humans who are treated unjustly. Darwin famous said that no benevolent God would create a wasp that would plant eggs into caterpillars and kill then slowly, by eating them from the inside.Unjust treatment of humans always has an answer. Unjust treatment of other beings does not. It is the greatest flaw in Catholic thought; it has no rational answer.
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Cancer can eat away slowly from the inside, until we die, and death has to be the greatest imperfection in all life.

It was always God’s intention that man should have eternal life, if not in this life but with God in heaven

Wisdom 2:23–3:9
God formed man to be imperishable;
the image of his own nature he made them.

But clearly mankind wants to do things our way and not God’s way. If we did things God’s way, then we would all live in peace with each other.
 
“If this is how you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few of them”
It is easy for us, even saints, to grow lIke this. The important thing is to be honest. I need to follow my advice, but be honest, “I really don’t like this,” but like Jesus, pray, “But in all things, not my will but yours”.

The key is to keep praying and praying. Do not ask for suffering unless you have a special gift, but accept sufferings and offer them up for Christ. Perhaps it is a God given penance of sorts.

Then, be grateful and thankful for such tough times, for by it you can grow “better or bitter,” and choose better. Like a metal, you have been tested to be stronger and more pure.

Let us not forget the most injustice ever: the Crucifixion of Our Lord. If our Lord is willing to, despite being perfect and innocent, do this for us, what are we, with our sins, going to complain about that He does not understand. But bring it all to Him.

Many saints suffered throughout their whole lives. It was not until his death that St Padre Pio would lose the painful, embarrasing stigmata.
 
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