On Love and Suffering

 To suffer willingly after that which you seek, and when finding it, to willingly suffer so as too keep it, this is to know that you love what you sought and kept; the key is to find that which is worth loving, and so, what is worth suffering for. 

As I explore the depths of suffering, which I have not even begun to contemplate, have not even begun to be exposed too, I am yet more persuaded that it is God who is worth it; worth all the loss, all the sorrow, all the grief; born wounded, and suffering from the wound that is this flesh, and this world of men in wounded flesh, one is apt to wonder at God; but I think I have learned that the wound of a friend is better than the kiss of an enemy, that 'the wound of a friend is faithful, but an enemy multiplies kisses'; and so if we are born wounded, and only ever seem to grow in our wounds, then perhaps then wound is from one who hates us; but it may just as well be from one who loves us. 

"I am wounded by love" and yet I wish to love, and to know that I love and am loved, and how shall I know that I am loved except those who love me willingly suffer for me, for what greater proof of love is this? and how shall I know that I love, unless I willingly suffer for them? 

But what is it to 'suffer for' someone, if not to suffer more that they might suffer less? and if we all suffer for each other, will we not all reduce suffering all the more; I hate suffering, I wish it to be gone, how then shall we destroy it? how shall it be reduced to nothing? By realizing that it is already nothing. But how can what is so evidently real be nothing? By contrast with that whose reality is greater by far, by contrast with that which will shift your very definition of what it means to be 'real'; so much so that you will find that suffering for the sake of something worth suffering for, something and someone worth loving, is precisely what turns suffering into nothing, for suffering is nothing to those who have found the love worth suffering for. 

But there are depths of suffering not yet explored, deeps of hell not yet fathomed; how can we know that the suffering we've not yet felt is worth feeling; how can we will to suffer that which we have yet to suffer, for one day I thought I knew everything of suffering, but then I suffered something new, and found I knew nothing of it; what and who can be worth suffering a suffering that is ever expanding in definition? For I may suffer for that which changes my definition of real, but then all that needs to come is that which will change my definition of suffering, how then shall we know that we have found one worth suffering for, we who know nothing of suffering? and how can someone ask us to seek to know more, to suffer more, when there is even the slightest chance that it may turn out not to have been worth it; who can ask us to dip our feet into hell once again, when we have only now just escaped, or only now grown accustomed enough to it, only now finally come to terms with suffering being our new reality?

But then I remember that time of old, when me and others had learned from God, I remember the goods he has done to the people of Israel, and to his people the Church, I have heard of the suffering of the tribes, I have heard of the suffering of my people the Church, I have heard of the suffering and death of God himself; and yet every time, 'every single time', love has proven itself true, every single time all things have worked out for those who love him, for those who have persevered till the end; every single time, faith, hope, and love in God have shown themselves worth it, and this present suffering has always shown itself not worthy to be compared with the wonders that would later come. 

What else could we ask for as proof? and even if we fall, isn't it worth it, to have had a chance to be part of this great story? This line of worthy men? To even be a footnote of a footnote of a footnote to the next Moses? The next Paul? The next Aquinas? If we shall not take our meaning in God, cannot we not at least find meaning in them, who are closer to us? 

And who are we? Men and women, jews and gentiles, slaves and free, black and white and hispanic and asian and all ethnicities, all peoples and nations, all tribes and tongues, all races, men of all temptations, all disabilities and weakness, all talents and strengths; look for one like you in some way and you'll find many, and even if you don't, how much better that you become the one now, that others might look and find you numbered among so worthy a public? 

I know the story of a man who was loved by his Father and Mother, and given a coat of many colors, but whose brothers hated him and sold him as a slave, this man suffered for years, and yet remained true to God, and for sake of it he became, bar one thing, equal in all things to the greatest there was in the land; only as regards the throne was he different; this same man would go on to become the namesake of one who would be the foster father of God himself. 

I know the story of a man who was raised with all the teachings and wisdom of three great nations; whose namesake was the first king of his own nation, and who in an ignorant zeal used all his power to destroy God's body; but who was brought to blindness and tears by God to see and know his folly, who was made small, and who by God's grace was given a new name meaning 'small', and who consider himself least of us all, and yet that man would come to teach a lesson whose name was one in meaning with the name of a great prophet through whom God prepared for himself the title 'son of man' that he would so often take on this; the lesson being this, that 'God is my judge', and this man taught many other lessons and would come to be the author of most of the works of scripture; showing how greatly God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. 

I know the story of God, who prepared a history for us, and who is always preparing a future for us, and who is always providing the present to us; the God who prepared for his son a body, and a people, and a calling, the son who was God who came into this world of suffering and suffered and died for us and with us, and who rose again from the dead that we might rise with him, and who ascended into heaven, that we might one day see heaven and earth fully reconciled in him as well; and this is the one whose spirit hovered over the face of the deep at the begining of creation, and who, through. overshadowing Mary, was born into this world, so that through the operation of his spirit did St. Joseph of the old testament and the new come to receive and follow their callings, and this same Jesus sent his Spirit into the Church, through whom we also have the Story of St. Paul, and the twelve, and all the saints till now, his Jesus who has through his spirit given us all we have, our past up to our present; and who has in the past given futures over and over again to so many; life's worth living, loves worth suffering for, despite new sufferings over and over; is he not worth trusting?

There is no limit on what is left to be said here, neither is what I said adequate to the topic, except at most as a glimpse of an edge of the frays of the truth I hope to touch upon; but I have faith that the depths of love are infinitely deeper and more expansive than even the furthest reaches and expanses of suffering; and I hope that I will live in a manner worthy of this faith, and die in a manner filled with the love that such faith and hope make possible; and I pray that God make my hope a reality; and that he brings us all to the realization of this hope; and into the depths of his love.