Why does the good God allow suffering?

By Shannon Woodroffe

Shannon Woodroffe

Suffering. A word and experience familiar to every human. And although it seems inevitable in our lives, we somehow spend many thoughts and much emotion and energy avoiding, resenting, or questioning life’s many challenges.  We may even attempt to ignore or mask their effect on us. And consequently, we forget that others too are broken and need of God’s mercy.

Sometimes, we make decisions solely to avoid suffering, sometimes contradicting consciences. Sometimes, we question God, “I thought this was it”, “But God I prayed about this”.

But where did these ideas of a suffering-free life even come from? While the desire for God, who is perfection, is written in our hearts, the thought of escaping suffering here is not from Him.

When He lived as a human being, He embraced His cross and commanded us to take up our own crosses and follow Him. He charged us to give up our lives for His sake. And He gave us His own perfect example to follow, being rejected by the world from birth, then during His public ministry until He was executed.

Last year, Covid-19 was declared a pandemic and we became aware of so much suffering in the world. Being unable to physically attend Good Friday service, I virtually attended the service presided over by Pope Francis. These words of Fr Raniero Cantalamessa’s homily have stayed with me: “What is the surest proof that the drink someone offers you is not poisoned? It is if that person drinks from the same cup before you do. This is what God has done: on the cross He drank, in front of the whole world, the cup of pain down to its dregs. This is how He showed us it is not poisoned, but that there is a pearl at the bottom of this chalice.”

It is an honour to drink from the same cup as Almighty God and truly, He is the way to Heaven. Suffering is the result of original sin and even those who never sinned (our Lord and our Holy Mother) suffered much here.

So, while we may be tempted to shout at the Lord or point our fingers at Him when the boat begins to rock, He permits suffering for our own good.  Suffering purifies and humbles. The Word of God commands us to “Endure [our] trials as ‘discipline’/ God treats [us] as sons/ For what ‘son’ is there whom his father does not discipline?”  (Heb 12:7).

Truly, trials and suffering are God’s pearls of love to us. He uses them to draw us closer to Him. “How many times,” Jesus said to Padre Pio, “would you have abandoned me, my son, if I had not crucified you.” To think that God said trials were needed to spare the soul of this saint!

When we accept trials and face them with Jesus, we enter His life and show our love for Him by following His command to take up our own cross and follow Him, by shouldering His yoke (Mt 11:29). By entering His life, we walk the via dolorosa that leads to His glory.

Suffering is redemptive not only for ourselves. As our Lord suffered and died for all of us, when we, as members of the Body of Christ unite our sufferings to His, like St Paul, “in [our] flesh [we are] filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, on behalf of His body, which is the Church” (Col 1:24). St Paul knew that his afflictions were their glory (Eph 3:13).

Our Lady of Fatima, as in her many other apparitions, exhorts us to “accept and bear with submission whatever suffering God permits in [our lives] today, for the love of [Jesus], for the conversion of sinners and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”

We may wonder, where is praying with faith in all this? God knows everything about us, and He wants us to share our thoughts, worries, anxieties, desires, our whole lives with Him.

He made us for relationship and intimacy with Him, and He does consider our requests. He does listen and respond with love and mercy. But our final statement must be as Jesus said: “Father, not my will but yours be done” (Lk 22:42). And while the Father did not take the cup from Him, He sent an angel to strengthen Him and you and I have hope today because He endured.

While our Lord has revealed much to us, there is still much that we do not understand but the One who made us knows us and knows what is best for us. As St Therese of Lisieux said, “How can [we] fear a God who is nothing but mercy and love?” So let us remember that “all things work for good for those who love God” (Rom 8:28) and that nothing can “separate us from the love of God” (Rom 8:39).

Let us even take up small mortifications to prepare ourselves for the cross.  Thomas à Kempis wrote in The Imitation of Christ, “In the cross is salvation…life…defense against our enemies…infusion of heavenly sweetness…strength of mind…joy of spirit…the height of virtue…the perfection of holiness.” Only in the Cross of Jesus. So let us not fear the Cross but look to the Cross of Jesus.

Shannon Woodroffe is a twenty-two-year-old mechanical engineer from Guyana, but first of all, God’s beloved. “I lived under three years in Trinidad during which the Lord showed me His love and manifested new life within me.”

Photo by soheyl dehghani on Unsplash