Taking advantage of our sorrows

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

SINCE sorrows are unavoidable in our life, we should know how to deal with it properly, even taking advantage of it, for it indeed can help us attain our ultimate goal in life, which is our own salvation, our own redemption.

In this we have to look closely at Christ who shows us the way of how to handle our sorrows. And greatly helping us in this regard is the Blessed Virgin who is our Mother and who is regarded also as Our Lady of Sorrows, whose memorial we celebrate on September 15. She shows us how to grieve and to deal with all sorts of suffering in our life.

We have to learn how to handle these predicaments. And the first thing to do is to develop a spiritual attitude and supernatural outlook in life, based on our faith in God that has to grow stronger everyday. That faith, of course, has to give rise to hope and be nourished by charity.

These are the most important aspects or dimensions in our life, and we should try our best that we become adept in handling them. They are the ones that give life and meaning to all the other aspects in our life—personal, family, social, professional, etc.

The celebration of the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows again brings to our mind the phenomenon of our suffering, pains and sorrows in life. What’s distinctive of this celebration is that it reminds us that all these worldly sorrows have a religious foundation, have a relation to God.

Our predicament today is that our attitude towards this unavoidable element in our life is taken out of its fundamental context of faith and religion. We just look at it in a purely human and natural way. We just look for the human and natural causes as well as for their human and natural solutions or remedies.

I think this is wrong, or at least, is quite handicapped. We would not be fathoming enough the enormity and richness of the nature and purpose of our sorrows in life if we fail to bring in the basic inputs of our Christian faith.

Thus, we often exaggerate or worsen our sufferings, as we fail to know their ultimate whys and wherefores. Thus, we often would not know how to suffer them, since we merely rely on our physical, emotional or psychological stamina, or some external material resources like drugs. The spiritual and supernatural way is not resorted to.

Worse, we often don’t realize that our pains and sorrows in life, irrespective of their causes and effects, are a rich material for our final redemption. In fact, many people’s idea of redemption is strictly earth and time-bound. Nothing spiritual or supernatural about it! Hardly any reference to our sin is done.

It would be good if we adapt the attitude of our Lady of Sorrows towards our problems in life. Certainly, meditating on the passion and death of Christ in a regular way would help a lot in developing that attitude.

That attitude brings our understanding and experience of sorrow to another level—deeper, more comprehensive, more integrated. For example, it helps us mediate the complicated interplay of the requirements of truth and freedom, and of charity, patience, mercy on the one hand, and as strict a justice on the other, etc.

With faith and with our Lady of Sorrows we can take advantage of sorrows so that through them we can gain eternal life.

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com