Even the healing didn’t go the way I thought it would. Even the solution . . . it just wasn’t my dream, my plan, my vision for my life. Again.

I felt like I had come so far in my grief and healing . . .but I guess not. Because when everything went bad again, I landed right back at the beginning of my grief, with all the fears, lack of trust, holding on to things that aren’t even there . . .it all begins again.

I guess its a little easier to navigate this time and hopefully my faith will get back up to speed a little quicker.

Its always the letting go and accepting that your fears may indeed come true–and yet the faith comes when you realize you will live.

On to my story:

I went to the Adoration Chapel yesterday. I was alone which was nice because I was just sobbing. It took a while to have strength to even leave there, but eventually it came.  I was asking God, Mary, Joseph and of course Padre Pio to show up and bring me some comfort . . . .Still praying for that miracle but its looking more and more like it’ll be in me, not the change to my circumstance that I wanted.

My strength began to return when an old Steven Curtis Chapman song came to my mind and I began to sing it:

If I could only fly,
I’d go up and look down from the sky
So I could see the bigger picture.
And Lord if I could sit with You
At Your feet for an hour or two
I’m sure I’d ask too many questions.
‘Cause there’s so much going on down here
That I must confess I just don’t understand.

But I have prayed.
And at your feet my whole life has been laid.
So I wont worry I wont be afraid
‘Cause my soul is resting on Your higher ways.

Let the road ahead become unclear.
I am Yours so what have I to fear
If my soul is resting on Your higher ways.

Your higher ways teach me to trust You.
Your higher ways are not like mine.
Your higher ways are the ways of the Father
Hiding His children in His love.

So let it rain.
And if my eyes grow dim with tears of pain,
This hope I have will not be washed away
‘Cause my soul is resting on Your higher ways.

 

It struck me when I sang: “I won’t worry; I won’t be afraid . . . .” and  “Let the road ahead become unclear. I am yours so what have I to fear . . . .”

At least I was standing  when I walked out of the Chapel . . .and then He was there. It had been a rainy day earlier, now the sun was shining as it hung low on the horizon getting ready to disappear for the night. The darker clouds gathered and the sun shone through and I looked up and saw, well, I guess it was hope. Not just saw it, but felt it. I felt God there. I felt like I would be okay no matter what.

As I drove away, the thought came to me that no matter what happened, I would live. I know it sounds strange and unless you are deep in grief, you may not understand. It’s a survival call. I would live through this. No matter what happened from here, I would live.

As I sang my favorite hymn, (Oh, God Beyond All Praising), these lyrics struck me:

and whether our tomorrows
be filled with good or ill,
we’II triumph through our sorrows
and rise to bless you still.

And I thought, that’s exactly what I want to do, triumph through my sorrow.

And for the first time, I saw a vision that maybe I could.

So that’s how God and perhaps Padre Pio finally showed up, began to help me change my heart. Yes, I’m still hurting, grieving and suffering. Yes, I still get bogged down in it. It’s a beginning. It’s taking those small steps and moving through the grief process-again. I did it once; I can do it again. With God’s grace.

 O God, beyond all praising,

We worship you today.
And sing a love amazing,
That song cannot repay.
for we can only wonder
at every gift you send,
at blessings without number
and mercies without end:
we lift our hearts before you
and wait upon your word,
we honor and adore you,
our great and mighty Lord.

Suffering well is about letting go.

But recently I decided I needed something to hold on to.

So I went to the Catholic bookstore and this is what I got:

A tangible token of my faith. Something to grasp in those moments of pain, in those moments when I’m crying out to God . . . and Padre Pio.

See recently, a priest with a devotion to Padre Pio, was mentioning (while he was holding a chalice that Padre Pio held–isn’t that unbelievable!) that when you friend Padre Pio, he never leaves you alone. I decided I didn’t want to be left alone . . .so I have been reaching out to him, not to mention because he is the patron saint of pain and suffering!

See my suffering took another turn and I feel like I’m back at the beginning and so I’ve been asking for a miracle from Padre Pio, either in the circumstance or in me.

I’ll let you know how that turns out. Here’s to hoping that he won’t leave me alone.

By the way, his feast day is a couple days away on September 23rd . . some of us are starting a novena to St. Therese that day . . .whose feast day is nine days after Padre Pio’s, two saints who are very special to me!

Care to join us?

http://www.ewtn.com/therese/novena.htm

I also got this yesterday:

The rosary I kept in my diaper bag has disappeared (that has 2-year-old written all over it). And I wanted something else to hold on to in times of intense prayer, something that was beautiful too, beauty always a reminder of God being present!

And one more thing to hold on to . . . .

Couldn’t resist that one!

There are other bears too! Visit St. Raphael’s bookstore:  http://www.saintraphaelcenter.com/bookstore.html

So that’s it. As I try to let go of my plans and dreams for my life, I am holding on to my faith.

photo courtesy of Miguel Saavedra

So it was like a roller coaster of hope and hopelessness.

The suffering comes and with it comes darkness, bleakness, and hopelessness.

The things appear to change a little bit . . . and hope returns.

But then there is another shift and hope disappears again.

What’s the problem here?

The problem is simple: what is my hope in?

Is all of my hope wrapped up in this circumstance, this path of suffering? Am I only hopeful when things seem to be going the way I want them to go?

How is it that I can still understand so little about suffering? How is it that I can still miss that suffering is a path of hope. If you wonder how I can say that, its because suffering means something in our lives has spun completely out of our control. And that means God is in control. Finally. And that means our future is full of hope, because God is planning it! He knows the path that is full of hope . . .if we can trust Him, let go of our fears and follow. Follow through the pain. Follow if the pain doesn’t seem to end.

The truth is if we love God and we follow Him, then our future is always hope-filled because we have the promises of Heaven waiting for us.

The truth is our lack of hope over our earthly situations and pain is just another sign of our weak faith–our focus on what is here on earth instead of what God has waiting for us in Heaven. And, it means that we don’t trust God to do what is best for us.

There is always hope to be had. We just don’t always feel it or see it.

but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:31

One of my favorite priests told me recently, “you become what you fear.”

We were talking about the fears I have relating to my suffering.

The fears that plague me. The fears that eat at me. The fears that could control me–if I let them.

But I recoginize the fear for what it is . . . .sin. Yes, this fear is so powerful. But it boils down to a lack of trust in God.

“Don’t let it turn you into someone you don’t want to be,” he said.

Because that’s what fear does to us. It eats at us. It paralyzes us. It makes us try to control situations or people that are beyond our control. All because we are so afraid of life not going the way we had planned.

But if we can just trust God, then we know we will be okay no matter what.

So much of handling suffering well boils down to trusting God-believing God’s word and His promise.

Then we know we will be okay no matter what.

I don’t think that means it won’t hurt. But it does mean we don’t have to be afraid.

St. John Chrysostom wrote:

It certainly is surprising what we learn about ourselves in suffering.

Some of it is good. We may learn of our toughness or strength (with God’s grace of course).

But our weaknesses are also exposed. A lot of the struggle we have is because of our own weak faith. We don’t have peace because we are fighting God. We don’t feel whole because we refuse to accept it. We are so depressed because this life matters so very much to us. Yes, those cracks in our faith really begin to show.

The first step is, when in the midst of these circumstances, to take note of our faith, our weaknesses. Why do we feel so distressed when St. Paul says he has learned to be content no matter what the circumstance?

Then, we turn to God with those weaknesses and ask that He help us to begin to change. Ask that He show us how to accept our suffering, how to have peace. And yes, maybe even someday to embrace it like those great saints we keep talking about.

It’s a blessing, really. I mean we could walk around with our weak faith never even realizing these defects, never growing. But suffering shines a spotlight on it and gives us the chance to ask God to help us change it. And if we want holiness more than anything, (and hopefully we do), then we want to identify and change these weaknesses.

For me, it was pretty much all of the things I mentioned. I really wanted to be happy in this life. It’s so hard for me to be satisfied knowing I will have happiness in Heaven.  It seems so intangible! And right along with that, how can I be happy in this life when my life plan doesn’t go the way I thought it should, the way I set it up to go? Funny, aren’t we? We want what we want. We need to want what God wants.

Praise God for this chance to grow in holiness!!

I started thinking about the prophet Jeremiah. He’s not a saint in the way we traditionally think, but I think we can be sure he is up in Heaven . . . .and so a saint.

Why? Because of his enduring faithfulness. The thing that struck me about Jeremiah is that he stayed the course faithfully even though he didn’t get to see the things he prophesied come about, even though no one listened to him, even though his heart was broken by the scattering and capture of the Jewish people. He didn’t die seeing God’s glory. He died sad and heartbroken, probably murdered by his own countrymen.

In other words, his life did not turn out the way he hoped at all. And in fact, he never got to see things turn out the way they should, or even things turn out well. But he was faithful until the end. He still believed in what God told Him and He still served God. He must have understood that this life is temporary and that there is glory and hope and fulfillment in the next life–that even if He couldn’t see it now, what God promised will come true. That is amazing faith. This is the life we can see, touch, and feel. And to never see the beauty, the fulfillment, the promise and still believe and still preach . . .it’s amazing. It’s beautiful. It’s faith.

Hopefully those of us who experience this severe suffering won’t suffer forever. One way or another our circumstances will probably change. Some of it may just be our acceptance and healing that changes the situation or sometimes something concrete will happen. God does answer prayers here on Earth too. But what if He doesn’t? If things never get better do we have enough faith to keep on in faith and to keep doing God’s will and to keep trusting Him? Do we have enough faith to not grow weary because we believe the best is yet to come–after this life is done?

I think of Mother Teresa also. I think it’s been pretty well published at this point that for the vast majority of her life and ministry, she was in complete spiritual darkness. And yet she kept serving so faithfully and so beautifully. Pure faith.

Consolation is those little feelings, moments etc. that God sends us to give us relief from our suffering or darkness, it’s the feeling of God in our soul.

Desolation is when we receive none of that.

Consolations are for the weak in faith. Only those truly spiritually mature can  receive desolation from God and keep serving.

I have often prayed for consolations. I guess I am just not ready to walk that path of spiritual darkness. I just don’t have my eyes on Heaven enough.

I’m no Jeremiah. And God knows it too.

So here is this suffering–here is my faith. Here is my spiritual growth . . .

It’s getting a little better now, but there were days when I would count down every hour because my only goal was to just survive the day.

There were moments when the grief was so paralyzing that I just didn’t even know how to get through it.

But God shows up and moves us through those days, those moments.

I am of the very firm opinion that God always gives us only what we can handle, but its always more than we think we can.

And so we see our total dependence on God . . . because we have to trust Him that He knows what we can handle, that He will see us through, that everything happens for a reason and that He works for the good of those who love Him. . . even when it really doesn’t look like it–or feel like it.

Because what we learn when we suffer is that we don’t have a choice. We find ourselves in the midst of suffering, and it’s nice to have someone to cry out to and to know that when our lives feel totally out of control–when we feel that we don’t have the control over what is happening in our lives–someone does. We don’t like being helpless or out of control. But the truth is we can’t control everything. That’s a lesson we have to learn the hard way-through our suffering. That’s what gives us the courage and the strength to admit we are totally dependent on God.

Steven Curtis Chapman wrote a song when his daughter died that expresses what I am trying to say:

So I was lying in bed thinking of how I probably need to go to Confession. And then I think when? And then I think do I really need to go? And then I think, it’s funny how we don’t do things we know would help us get through a tough time.

Like, a more minor example, if you’ve ever gotten into the habit of a daily prayer time and Bible reading and reflection and then kind of fallen off the wagon with it, you know what I mean when I say you usually get into a funk. Things don’t click. YOu feel out of sorts, overwhelmed, etc . . . . And yet the answer is right there. We just need to get ourselves back on track.

And so it is sometimes in the midst of our intense suffering with our prayer time, making sure we are getting to Adoration, Confession and Mass regularly, daily meditation and Bible reading and reflection . . . .

Sometimes we do do these things more as we feel God is all we have. But sometimes we let it fall by the wayside–and just let ourselves feel bad. Of course, the kind of pain that suffering cause is not like the being out of sorts I described in the beginning. We can’t “fix” it by rededicating ourselves to our prayer life, but we can help soften the pain by gaining that right perspective and opening ourselves up to God’s grace and healing.

Why do we let this stuff go when we suffer so much?

• Depression–lacking the will to do much of anything
• Being mad at God or just plain confused by Him allowing this to happen
• The feeling that our suffering is so intense that we should get an “easy pass” with other things
• Spending time in a kind of desperate prayer more and thinking that is sufficient for our growth so we don’t have to keep up with other commitments (meditation, Adoration etc….)

Anyway, if we allow ourselves to really analyze our situation, its almost laughable that we avoid the things that can make us stronger. That’s our human nature, I guess (like I want to lose weight but I don’t want to diet and exercise!).We want to hurt less but we don’t want to actively do something about it!

So, yes, I do need to get to Confession and allow myself the opportunity to receive God’s grace, be strengthened by it, and keep going on my path to holiness!

We want what we want.

I think its easy to try and make God accept our plan for our life instead of trying to figure out what His plan is. Its easy to not realize we are doing this too. We have got a hundred reasons why our plan for our lives makes sense and why it should be God’s plan too.

Maybe that’s why He has to knock us off our feet to get us to listen.

He has to take away what we are clinging to that is getting in the way of our listening to Him. He has to completely change our direction.

That’s when we look finally look up and say “God what do you want???”

Do you think sometimes we don’t ask that question because we don’t want to know what the answer is? We are comfortable with our plans. In fact, we probably spend a lot of time trying to convince ourselves that our plans is what God wants and we spend time trying to convince God of that too. Again, is it any wonder sometimes that God allows us to suffer in order to bring us to holiness, to bring us to Him?

And–it’s not just asking the question. The difference when we ask God what He wants when we are suffering is that we genuinely want to know! We want to know the true answer. We need to know the true answer.

My suffering has taken some twists and turns and back and forth and back . . .and sometimes its hard to know the right way to go.  A lot of people will tell you a lot of things. Sometimes even in the midst of the suffering it’s hard to know how to handle it all. Emotions are high. Just like I was saying, I don’t always handle it well. It’s all uncharted waters. But I do want to know how God wants me to handle it–daily and that plan for my life.

What do I have to come back to, except what does God want? Yes, that quiet time in prayer–and asking a whole lot of people to pray for you–and then you follow.

Wow, so I started thinking about one of my favorite saints, St. John Vianney, the Cure de Ars. He knew suffering–not only did he undergo a lot of skepticism, doubt and criticism because he was not the most astute,  but he also endured real, physical attacks by the devil and then added to this suffering with his own mortifcations of things like eating nothing but a boiled potato and spending 16 to 18 hours a day in the confessional. It was said he had such a gift for saving people’s souls that the bishop wouldn’t let him travel so he could stay and tend to the souls.

But anyway, the point is I went to look up quotes from him about suffering and wouldn’t you know, I discovered he had a whole catechism on suffering, so much more beautifully written then I could ever write or summarize.

Here’s a snippet:

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.

On the Way of the Cross, you see, my children, only the first step is painful. Our greatest cross is the fear of crosses. . . . We have not the courage to carry our cross, and we are very much mistaken; for, whatever we do, the cross holds us tight — we cannot escape from it. What, then, have we to lose? Why not love our crosses and make use of them to take us to Heaven? But, on the contrary, most men turn their backs upon crosses, and fly before them. The more they run, the more the cross pursues them, the more it strikes and crushes them with burdens. . . . If you were wise, you would go to meet it like Saint Andrew, who said, when he saw the cross prepared for him and raised up into the air, “Hail O good cross! O admirable cross! O desirable cross! receive me into thine arms, withdraw me from among men, and restore me to my Master, who redeemed me through thee. “

Emphasis is mine.

To read the rest, click here: http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/stj18020.htm.

Later in his writing, he says,  “In order to get to Heaven, we must suffer.”

And so once again, the saints humble us. yes, we run and fight our suffering just like he talks about. And what he says is if we would just stop fearing it, we could learn to love it. We could use it. We could embrace it!

I have not loved my crosses. I have feared them. What a reminder that I have a long way to go on this faith journey . . . and its my suffering that’s going to get me there!