Cry of the Heart (page 4)

 As a striving towards transcendence, creative suffering – as we've seen expressed in Germain Greer's anguished words – opens us to others who are also suffering, thus creating a solidarity among those who suffer. To suffer together means to walk together towards transcendence. This solidarity is the proper human response to suffering... What we share is the questioning – and thus we suffer with the one who suffers. We co-suffer with that person.
    Since suffering reflects the transcendence of the human person, since it points to a Mystery that is the author of the drama of human life, then we cannot really use suffering to deny the existence of God. Instead, it is because there is a God that suffering exists as human being experience it. The suffering of human beings is a sign of God. (Page 4 - top of page 5)

I have noticed, since I've gotten sick again, that certain friends have faded away. I simply haven't heard from them since I communicated the recurrence of my cancer. I think I understand them – they're deeply disturbed and terrified of losing me. Their love for me makes them feel that my loss would be an awful thing, something they can't bear. To be near me, to see me suffer, would only intensify this sense of horror and loss, and it's something they instinctively recoil from. I think this is the human condition without redemption. Extreme suffering is simply impossible to witness, especially in one we love. So I can't blame those who don't have the stamina or stomach to stay in touch with me. They have no intention of making me feel lonely or abandoned. In fact, I think it breaks their hearts and makes them feel horrible that they keep "forgetting" to reach out. 

To hang in there with the suffering person – especially, to hang in there without offering "answers" or solutions – is impossible without a special, divine gift (a grace). Those who can do it should take no credit for their capacity because the strength doesn't come from them. Only God can make this co-suffering possible. 

This solidarity that Albacete speaks of is a real thing. Going to the hospital, I would feel the weight of it. Sitting in the little waiting area (it held 10 chairs in a U shape) right outside the radiation rooms, we patients would always strike up conversations. Cancer is so democratic – it strikes all types, from every walk of life – but there we'd be, brought together by this one enemy, and there would be an immediate intimacy. These people would share their hopes and fears, their pain and their relief – all sometimes within a five minute conversation. These conversations, no matter how short or long, would always end, as one person would be led back to the radiation machines, with "I'll pray for you," or "God bless you." Always. I don't know what religion the others were, and I was not always the one to invoke the Almighty. Their are no atheists when it comes to cancer. At least, I never met one. 

So walking in the big hospital (visitors always remark that it's the size of a city), one feels the weight of all the suffering people, especially the children. This is a weight that is impossible for the strong and healthy to discern. It's there, like a cloud, hanging over the shoulders and head of every person who enters and leaves, but only one in real pain, or suffering a big loss, can feel it bearing down on her. And it's a welcome weight, like a weighted blanket. We are part of something greater than we are. We are not alone. And this is, indeed, a sign of God. 

 

Cry of the Heart: pages 1-3

[...] Every fiber of my own heart vibrates with this anguished protest. I too would join Wiesel, Mauriac, and all who have experienced such horrors [of the Holocaust] in cursing this face of the Infinite. And yet, there is something else in my heart that will also not go away – the certainty that this anger cannot be, and cannot be allowed to be, the last word about human life.
    The last word must be the hope of the same heart that causes me still to protest, to rail against the infinite Mystery that permits such horrors to happen. [page 3]

To me, this is a great mystery. How is it that some people – people with great minds and great hearts (Wiesel and Mauriac) – could let their anger have the last word? It makes me wonder: "Albacete, how can you be so sure? You haven't seen anything so horrific as the events in the concentration camps..." But then I remember people like Max Kolbe, Edith Stein, Corrie Ten Boom, and I think, "Yes, Albacete would be among these who kept their certainty in mercy and hope, even in the worst circumstances known to humanity."

I don't know what makes the difference, but I want to be with Albacete (and Kolbe, Stein, and Ten Boom). I want to stake everything on mercy and hope. 

What sort of education or training do I need in order to land among those with hope, rather than among those for whom anger becomes the last word?

Cry of the Heart, Ch 1, Paragraph 1

 Chapter 1 “A Mystery to be Lived” 

I would never attempt to offer an answer to the problem that suffering poses to believers. Suffering is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be lived. As a Catholic Christian, I see the problem of suffering as inseparable from the cross of Jesus. But this is not the perspective I have adopted here, because I do not wish to begin by speaking only to other Christians. I want to start by reflecting on experiences we all have because we are human beings, whatever our beliefs. 

Two very provocative points, right out of the gate: a priest who would never attempt to offer an answer to the problem of suffering. Can I say the same of myself? When I was younger, I was often in a hurry to explain – I thought I was offering a gift by spelling out what the catechism teaches about suffering. This made me feel like a "star pupil" who had the "right answer," but also like a generous person who could dispense the true meaning to people who, once they received my explanation, could be at peace because they knew the truth. 

Now when I think of these experiences, I wonder why I was in such a hurry to dispense with these explanations? When I search my conscience, I can't find any motive beside a genuine desire to help, to ease suffering, to provide an adequate meaning. Unfortunately, I was in the wrong, and I started to realize this before reading Albacete's book. I think it's important to mention motive because we can be very well-meaning and have the correct answers but still be wrong. We need to acknowledge this first for ourselves but also when dealing with others who make the mistakes we've overcome – we must remember that their hearts are in the right place, and they're acting out of love, a love untempered by wisdom, but still it's true love, and it may even be superior to our own capacity to love. 

What is the second provocative point? "Suffering is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be lived." How often do we rush in with solutions? "Try this diet"... or "Here's a device that might help with that"... or "You should change doctors"... or "Take this herb/vitamin/medicine" etc. What would it look like to instead confront someone else's suffering as a "mystery to be lived"? 

I can't help but think that it has to do with presence: recognizing that our presence (MY presence) has more value than all the solutions we could think up. We want to eliminate the suffering, but the person suffering needs companions who can enter into their life with them far more than she needs suggestions and solutions. In fact, the solutions others offer can feel hostile or belittling and certainly alienating. Even professional helpers (doctors, lawyers, social workers, therapists, etc.) who will not first offer their presence and companionship cannot be trusted to find correct solutions. This is because the various disciplines that serve to relieve suffering are each an art that requires humanity to be effective. 

If anyone would like a conversation on this paragraph, we could use this question as a jumping off point: What would it look like to instead confront someone else's suffering as a "mystery to be lived"?