Oblates of St. Francis de Sales

New DeSales World Newsletter - Summer Edition

Fourth Sunday of Easter (April 17, 2005)

Suggested Emphasis

"If you put up with suffering for doing what is right, this is acceptable in God's eyes."

Salesian Perspective

We hear echoes of this first Letter of Peter in one of St. Jane de Chantal's exhortations to the members of her community, the Sisters of the Visitation. She remarked: "Let us look to our Savior in the excess of his sufferings and the excess of his love. Let us keep our hearts always on these things, so that our divine Savior may communicate and give us the strength to suffer the things that his adorable hand may send us." (Conferences, page 255)

How can our suffering ever compare with the suffering that Jesus experienced? If we are speaking about the suffering of the last day of his life, there really is no comparison. However, if we consider the suffering that accompanies the efforts to suffer - that is, to bear with - others, we actually have a great deal more in common with Jesus' suffering than we might otherwise think.

Look at the word suffering itself. It is not only about "putting up" with something difficult, harmful or painful. Suffering comes from the Latin sufferre, meaning, "to carry, to bear, to give birth... or life."

Made in the image and likeness of God, redeemed by the love of Christ and inspired by the Spirit, we all have a responsibility to carry: to live our lives for others. We are called to carry the responsibility to love one another, to help one another, to challenge one another, to heal one another, to forgive one another, to encourage one another. Children of God, brothers and sisters of Christ, we carry the burdens and inconveniences that come with living lives of generous service.

In short, we are called to live like Jesus lived... and to carry, to bear with whatever may come with that life choice. "It was for this that you were called, since Christ suffered for you and left you an example, to have you follow in his footsteps."

St. Jane clearly recognized the suffering, the inconvenience, the stretching that living for others will bring: "We must have a large heart toward our neighbor, which means in affection, love and help, being ever ready to serve, to assist, to comfort, bear with and support in every way in our power, but cheerfully and cordially. A large heart is a heart ready for all sorts of inconveniences, an open heart that loves before all things the will of God." (Conferences, page 174)

This is God's will for us: that we should not endure a suffering that leads to death, but a suffering that leads, as St. Jane observed, "to a new life, in God's grace and in God's love, in this world, and then forever in glory... ," the suffering that comes from bearing with - carrying - one another in love. (Conferences, page 117 - 118) Or, as St. Paul wrote in his letter to the Ephesians, (4:2) let us live a life worthy of our calling, being completely humble and gentle, bearing with one another... lovingly.

Rev. Michael S. Murray, OSFS is Executive Director of the De Sales Spirituality Center.