Our Lady of Sorrows and Us

Jesus lived, died, and rose to save the world.  But just as God invites humanity to be co-creators, sharing in the work of caring for creation, so God calls each of us to share in the work of salvation. In one sense the work of salvation is complete because of what Jesus did.  But, in another sense, it is ongoing because not everyone knows Jesus, nor has everyone accepted the salvation he won for them.  This is where we come in.  We are called to do what St. Paul said he did in his Letter to the Colossians 1: 24: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church...."

It almost sounds as though Paul is saying that what Jesus did was not sufficient, but he would never say that.  We ought to read this passage in light of St. Paul's other writings, in particular, what he says about the Body of Christ in 1 Corinthians 12.  Christ is the Head of the Body.  We are members of the Body, joined to Christ.  What Christ has done, we the Body are now called to do.  When we join our sufferings to the perfect offering of Christ on the cross and at Mass, we play a role in the ongoing work of salvation.

Mary is our model in this.  "Lumen Gentium," the Vatican Council II document on the Church, quotes St. Ambrose and states that "the Mother of God is a type of the Church" (#63).  She stood under the cross of Jesus and did not scream or try to stop the soldiers from crucifying her own flesh and blood. She shared in her Son’s faith that this act of violence would not be the end, that somehow God would bring great good from it, that God was saving the world through it.  She had great faith, but it didn’t take away her own pain and sorrow.

We are called to have that same faith when it comes to our own sufferings.  In "The Joy of the Gospel" Pope Francis wrote these encouraging words: "No single act of love for God will be lost, no generous effort is meaningless, no painful endurance is wasted.  All of these encircle our world like a vital force" (#279).  

The Triumph of Our Crosses

On September 14 we celebrated the Exaltation or Triumph of the Holy Cross.  I gave the following homily to a group at the Sacred Heart Retreat House in Alhambra, CA.

We are celebrating a great mystery today. It's the mystery of how God saved the world from sin and death.

In the first reading (Numbers 21: 4b-9) we heard of a paradox: how a serpent, the source of death, was lifted up and became a source of healing.

This prefigured Jesus who took upon himself sin and death, was lifted up on the cross, and became the source of ultimate healing.  The cross--an instrument of death--became the instrument of life. The sign of failure and utter defeat became the sign of victory.

In the Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Churches there is a beautiful hymn that is sung over and over again at Easter: "Christ trampled down death by death."

Who would have thought it?  Not Satan who was behind the crucifixion and who thought he had won but was defeated.

Now it's our turn.  Jesus told us to pick up our crosses and to follow him.  We are to pick up the daily hardships, sufferings, and frustrations--all those things that call for sacrifice--and unite them to the cross of Jesus. By following him in this way we follow him to victory.

The Bishops at the end of the Second Vatican Council had a series of messages for various groups of people including the poor, the sick, and the suffering. To them they said:

All of you who feel heavily the weight of the cross, you who are poor and abandoned, you who weep, you who are persecuted for justice, you who are ignored, you the unknown victims of suffering, take courage. You are the preferred children of the kingdom of God, the kingdom of hope, happiness and life. You are the brothers of the suffering Christ, and with Him, if you wish, you are saving the world.

This is the Christian science of suffering, the only one which gives peace. Know that you are not alone, separated, abandoned or useless. You have been called by Christ and are His living and transparent image. In His name, the council salutes you lovingly, thanks you, assures you of the friendship and assistance of the Church, and blesses you.

Of course Jesus is the one Savior of the world. He won salvation through his death and resurrection. But not everyone knows of this victory nor has accepted it. Now each one of us plays a role in the ongoing work of salvation.

Christ won the victory. It may not seem like it, but victory is assured. Evil will not win in the end, just as it did not win when Jesus was crucified.  Have hope! You too will triumph with Christ if you join your crosses to his.

Our human tendency is to want to see tangible results, to know that our prayers and sacrifices--all the sufferings we offer up--are making a difference.  Pope Francis addressed this in his Apostolic Exhortation "The Joy of the Gospel" (#278-9) and he offered a word of hope:

Faith also means believing in God, believing that he truly loves us, that he is alive, that he is mysteriously capable of intervening, that he does not abandon us and that he brings good out of evil by his power and his infinite creativity. It means believing that he marches triumphantly in history with those who “are called and chosen and faithful” (Rev 17:14). ...

Because we do not always see these seeds growing, we need an interior certainty, a conviction that God is able to act in every situation, even amid apparent setbacks.... It involves knowing with certitude that all those who entrust themselves to God in love will bear good fruit (cf. Jn 15:5). This fruitfulness is often invisible, elusive and unquantifiable. We can know quite well that our lives will be fruitful, without claiming to know how, or where, or when. We may be sure that none of our acts of love will be lost, nor any of our acts of sincere concern for others. No single act of love for God will be lost, no generous effort is meaningless, no painful endurance is wasted. All of these encircle our world like a vital force. Sometimes it seems that our work is fruitless, but mission is not like a business transaction or investment, or even a humanitarian activity. It is not a show where we count how many people come as a result of our publicity; it is something much deeper, which escapes all measurement. It may be that the Lord uses our sacrifices to shower blessings in another part of the world which we will never visit. The Holy Spirit works as he wills, when he wills and where he wills; we entrust ourselves without pretending to see striking results. We know only that our commitment is necessary. Let us learn to rest in the tenderness of the arms of the Father....

The theme of our retreat this weekend has been the question of Jesus, "Who do you say that I am?" Our answer today is, "You are the winner!"  You are the one who defeated sin and death with a cross. You are the one who now invites each of us to be a winner.

St. Joan of Arc and St. Therese of Lisieux

It’s the feast of St. Joan of Arc who was burned at the stake on this day in 1431 when she was 19 years old.  She was a favorite saint of St. Therese of Lisieux who is one of the patron saints of the Apostleship of Prayer in which she enrolled when she was 12. 

In a letter to a missionary priest, St. Therese wrote : “In my childhood, I dreamed of combating in the battlefield. When I began to learn the history of France, I was enchanted with the deeds of Joan of Arc; I felt in my heart a desire and courage to imitate them.”

On January 21, 1894, Therese played the leading role in a play she had written about St. Joan of Arc. Her sister Celine photographed her posing as the saint in prison.  Then, just six days later, Pope Leo XIII officially opened the cause for Joan’s beatification.  In May of that year, Therese wrote a poem entitled “Canticle to Obtain the Canonization of the Venerable Joan of Arc.”  It contains these lines:

7. It is not Joan's victories
We wish to celebrate this day.
My God, we know her true glories
Are her virtues, her love.

8. By fighting, Joan saved France.
But her great virtues
Had to be marked with the seal of suffering,
With the divine seal of Jesus her Spouse!

10. Joan, you are our only hope.
From high in the Heavens, deign to hear our voices.
Come down to us, come convert France.
Come save her a second time.

12. Sweet martyr, our monasteries are yours.
You know well that virgins are your sisters,
And like you the object of their prayers
Is to see God reign in every heart.

4 Refrain
To save souls
Is their desire.
Ah! Give them your fire
Of apostle and martyr!

In April, 1897 St. Therese’s tuberculosis had progressed to the point that she became seriously ill and in July she was moved from her room to the community’s infirmary. In May she wrote the poem “To Joan of Arc” in which she speaks of the value of suffering:

When the Lord God of hosts gave you the victory,
You drove out the foreigner and had the king crowned.
Joan, your name became renowned in history.
Our greatest conquerors paled before you.

But that was only a fleeting glory.
Your name needed a Saint's halo.
So the Beloved offered you His bitter cup,
And, like Him, you were spurned by men.

At the bottom of a black dungeon, laden with heavy chains,
The cruel foreigner filled you with grief.
Not one of your friends took part in your pain.
Not one came forward to wipe your tears.

Joan, in your dark prison you seem to me
More radiant, more beautiful than at your King's coronation.
This heavenly reflection of eternal glory,
Who then brought it upon you? It was betrayal.

Ah! If the God of love in this valley of tears
Had not come to seek betrayal and death,
Suffering would hold no attraction for us.
Now we love it; it is our treasure.

Because Jesus suffered and then entered into glory, those who suffer can be configured more closely to him. Their sufferings, united to the Cross, can be a powerful prayerful offering that helps in the ongoing work of the salvation of souls so that they will, as St. Therese wrote, “see God reign in every heart.”

Our Participation in the Work of Salvation

When I was growing up, if something bad happened and I cried or moped, the Sisters in my grade school would say three words. No, not "get over it," but, "offer it up."  The origin of this practice can be found in the first reading at Mass today (Colossians 1:24-2:3).

St. Paul called himself "a minister in accordance with God's stewardship." He is minister of the Gospel which had been given to him to build up the Church. He was minister of "the mystery of God." What is that mystery?

God is Love. This Love is not so much a noun as a verb, not so much a feeling as action. St. Ignatius wrote that love shows itself better in deeds than in words. It is active. The very nature of God is active love. God has revealed Himself as a Trinity, a Communion of Divine Persons.

This great mystery of the Christian faith--that God is Love, that God is a Trinity of Persons, Three and One--includes humanity.  It is the nature of love to share. God, as it were, goes out of Himself to share existence and life and love with other beings which He has created.  God pours Himself into creation. God loves and in loving desires a return of love that resembles the love between the Father and the Son.  It is to this mystery that Paul has dedicated his life.

Just as the Three Persons of the Trinity are three and one, so God desires union with all creation. God wants to bring all into one. This is the great mystery which Paul writes about elsewhere: "that God may be all in all" (1 Corinthians 15:28).

Our union with God begins at Baptism and is strengthened with each Eucharist.  Through Baptism we are joined to the Body of Christ and in the Eucharist Jesus unites His flesh and blood with ours. This is the mystery Paul writes about in our first reading: "this mystery among the Gentiles; it is Christ in you...."

Now we can understand the meaning of the first verses of today's reading: "I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the affliction of Christ on behalf of his Body, which is the Church...."  Nothing was lacking in the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus. It was sufficient to save the world. But many in the world have not heard this good news and many have rejected it. The world has not accepted the salvation that Christ won for us on the cross.

But we are one with Christ. He is the Head and we are Body. We now play a role in the ongoing salvation of the world, in helping the world to accept the salvation Christ won for us.  The one thing lacking in the sufferings of Christ is our own participation in them. What the Head has done the Body must also do. This doesn't mean we have to go out looking for suffering. It will come our way at one time or another. When it comes we have a choice: to complain and grow bitter or to turn that suffering into a powerful prayer and act of love by uniting it to the cross of Jesus. 

What motivates us to do this, to offer up our suffering? The same thing that motivated St. Paul. In 2 Corinthians 5:14 Paul writes that "the love of Christ impels us." The knowledge of the love of Jesus urges us on; it motivates us to join Him in the work of salvation. One with Jesus, we share His love for those for whom He suffered, died, and rose. 

The love that was within His Heart motivated Jesus to act without delay. In today's Gospel (Luke 6:6-11) there is a story of how Jesus healed a man with a withered hand on the sabbath.  In a similar story, a synagogue official complained: "There are six days when work should be done. Come on those days to be cured, not on the sabbath day" (Luke 13:14). But Jesus can't wait to heal the afflicted. His love urges Him to act sooner rather than later. 

I'm reminded of what Blessed Antonio Rosmini wrote as a young priest in his personal Rules of Conduct: "To never refuse charitable services toward one's neighbor when divine Providence would offer and present them to me." 

I'm reminded as well of the saint whom we honor today, Peter Claver. The love of Christ urged him to not delay in responding to the needs of the African slaves as they arrived at the port of Cartagena in Colombia. Another Jesuit saint, a brother, St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, taught him about prayer and the love of God. This knowledge motivated Peter to become a missionary, but not in a way he imagined. Inspired by the example of another Jesuit who served the slaves, he gave his life for them. He made a vow to be a slave of the African slaves forever. As the slave ships arrived he ventured into their holds to care for the sick saying that they must first be shown the love of God before they were told of it. 

And so too for us. The love of Christ urges us on as well. It motivates us to lose no opportunity that comes our way to offer up our suffering for the spread of the Gospel and the salvation of all. 

Vatican II on Offering It Up

I received a short note today from someone who is struggling. In a previous note I learned that she struggles with an illness of the mind. She is able to do some volunteer work and to participate in some activities at her parish, but she still feels useless because she does not have a job and receives disability checks. She wrote: "I always feel like I'm not good enough and God is mad at me." I wrote back and shared with her a favorite but often overlooked quote from the Documents of the Second Vatican Council.

On December 8, 1965, at the close of the Council, Pope Paul VI delivered Messages from the Bishops to various groups. One of them was addressed "To the Poor, the Sick, and the Suffering," and it speaks to a common temptation--thinking that suffering is a sign that God is "mad" at you. On the contrary, the Bishops said that people who suffer are not being punished by God, nor are they abandoned by Him. The Bishops called them "the preferred children of the kingdom of God," and stated emphatically, "you are not alone, separated, abandoned or useless." Why? Because, as the Council Fathers said, "You are the brothers of the suffering Christ, and with Him, if you wish, you are saving the world."

When our sufferings are united to the Cross, they play a part in the salvation of the world. When our sufferings are offered up with Christ in His perfect sacrifice at Mass, they "are saving the world." At one time or another suffering is inevitable. It's part of life. But we do have a choice in regards to what we do with the suffering. If we wish, we can use it, as members of the Body of Christ, to carry on the work of Jesus, the Head of the Body. We can, as St. Paul wrote, fill up "what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ" (Colossians 1: 24). We can help save the world.

"In His Most Sacred Heart"

When I'm not travelling, I try to catch up on reading the various newspapers and periodicals to which I subscribe. Usually I'm weeks or months behind. Having worked in western South Dakota for nine years, I subscribe to the Rapid City Diocese's newspaper "West River Catholic." It's a way that I can keep up with the news of that special piece of God's creation and my friends there.

In the September issue there was a special Vocations Section that included a reflection by a seminarian, Tom Lawrence, entitled "In His Most Sacred Heart." In it he wrote about his experience of the suffering that resulted from a near head-on collision that left him with a broken femur and tibia, three broken ribs, and a ruptured spleen. Here is part of his moving reflection:

"During my recovery, God showed his unfailing presence to me through the love and wisdom of my mother. God also stripped away those things that used to get me through hard times. All that I had left was God himself. I was given the realization that if I tried to push through or ignore the pain or turn inward on myself, simply remaining in my mind, then I was being distracted from seeing Christ who was with me. He gave me the ability to see beyond my fear--the fear that this pain would never end.

"I have come to know--through prayer and experience--that Christ will never abandon me. He is the one who is most intimately present to me now, and he has been intimately present to me throughout my whole life. Christ has given me the faith to embrace him everywhere, especially in his suffering upon the Cross. It is Christ who carries me through my suffering into his most Sacred Heart. I have received this grace by uniting my suffering to his upon the Cross. By resting in Christ's love he deflates our pride, so that the person God has created us to be may 'fit' in his most Sacred Heart--within his infinite embrace of love. This is the beautiful place where Jesus takes us to find rest from our fears and our anxieties. This is the place where we discover our true selves. This is where Jesus brings us to the fullness of life!"

Blessed Louis Guanella

As I come to the end of my retreat with the Daughters of St. Mary of Providence, I’m grateful for a surprise favor: learning about their founder, Blessed Louis Guanella, who enrolled in the Apostleship of Prayer when he was he was a twenty year old seminarian in his native Italy.

Fr. Guanella was born in 1842, died in 1915, and was beatified by Pope Paul VI in 1964. On July 1, 2010 Pope Benedict approved a miracle attributed to his intercession, thus opening the way for his canonization. He founded two orders: for women, the Daughters, and for men, the Servants of Charity. This wasn’t their original name. They were first called the Sons of the Sacred Heart, but Fr. Guanella changed that so they would not be confused with other men’s congregations.

It’s clear, though, that devotion to the Sacred Heart was the inspiration for all he did. His early biographer, Fr. Leonardo Mazzucchi, of the Servants of Charity, in his book “The Life, the Spirit and the Works of Father Louis Guanella,” wrote: “He had a deep devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus at a time when very few people practiced it. This devotion was to be the most fruitful source of his angelic piety, the inspiration of his particular love for the Blessed Sacrament and his practice of daily communion…. Therefore, he then and always thereafter promoted the Apostleship of Prayer, which is a useful and important form of this devotion” (page 19).

Fr. Guanella wrote an inspiring prayer book entitled, “In the Month of Fervor: Thirty Scriptural Maxims Developed on the Sacred Heart of Jesus for Christian Souls.” The following is a prayer at the end of his reflection for the third day entitled “The Heart of Jesus at His Birth in Bethlehem”:

O Most Holy Heart of Jesus, I cannot love you as the Blessed Mother loved you. I feel bad about it. I would like to love you, as the chaste Joseph did. At least, O Lord, make me love you with simplicity and affection equal to that of the devout shepherds. How happy will I be when I will really begin to love you! How fortunate I will be when, enkindling my accent, I will be able to applaud around you with the choirs of angels, saying: “Glory to God in the highest, and peace on earth to men of good will!”

It should be no surprise that the first church he built was dedicated to the Sacred Heart. Fr. Louis D’Antuono said the following about Fr. Guanella, this church, and the statue of the Sacred Heart in it: “With that he wished to show that they (i.e. the orphans, the aged, the needy women in the house) must not seek comfort except in this divine and compassionate Heart, who living in this world felt a lively pity for the poor and the unfortunate. Those poor residents are sick and afflicted, more in heart than in body. Since it is the heart that resents the strokes of bad fortune, it is the heart that gives them the greatest torment. So, there was a need of a heart to cure them and give them the lost peace. Very well then, Father Guanella, knowing that, sought this heart and found it in the Heart of Jesus. So the Church was consecrated to the Divine Heart. Father Guanella wanted to procure consolations for his residents, and gave them a Heart which is the source of every consolation. He wanted to procure mercy for them and gave them a Heart essentially merciful. He wanted to give them a father, a friend, a lover, and gave them the Heart of Jesus, Who is not only the father and friend of the poor but puts Himself in their place: What you do to the poor, he said, you do to me. That statue, raised in the new church, seems to say to all who pass through this blessed door: ‘These poor, these aged, these sick people, these unfortunate ones are my children. Do good to them and I will give you a reward’” (pages 78-9).

The love of the Heart of Jesus led him to especially love those who were most abandoned—the poor, the developmentally disabled, the elderly. Prayer led to service. This too is part of the Apostleship of Prayer. His biographer, Fr. Mazzucchi, wrote:

“In February 1894, Father Louis wrote: ‘We must always pray, but at this time it is necessary that we make prayer a real apostolate.’ So he presented the Apostleship of Prayer, which he wanted to institute in the Church of the Sacred Heart…. Later he wrote: ‘The Apostleship of Prayer is like the center of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The prayer of the agonizing Jesus pierces the Heart of God. This prayer, thus passing through the Sacred Heart, penetrates heaven and earth. In supplicating, the fervent Christian imitates this prayer of the Divine Incarnate Word. Thus the prayer of the good people sustains the world today, that it may not crash under the weight of iniquity’” (page 90).

In June 1912 Blessed Louis Guanella said: “Our Works gushed forth from the most august Heart of God, Who has fructified and sustained them; and we cannot expect them to prosper and be inflamed with charity unless we unite ourselves to the Heart of Jesus Christ to perceive His virtues and draw forth His favors” (page 171).

This devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which led him to have compassion on the poor and neglected of society, and to practical works of charity on their behalf, also inspired his love for the Eucharist. He saw the Heart of Jesus in the Eucharist and often made reference to the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus. On Easter, 1913 he wrote: “Let us seek to make our life the life of the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, well convinced that we must fill our hearts with the spirit of faith and charity if we want to do good to our souls, to alleviate the grave needs that surround us, and to relieve the many corporal and spiritual miseries of our neighbors” (page 171).

In summary, we can quote Fr. Mazzucchi again: “We have affirmed that Father Louis Guanella’s piety was directed, above all, to honor and implore the mercies of the Sacred Heart of Jesus present in the Eucharist. As an Apostle of the Eucharist, Father Louis chose the Sacred Heart of Jesus as protector of his Work. Since he knew that daily material and spiritual graces would be abundantly showered from the Divine Heart upon his Houses, he wanted his followers to draw the strength, power of sacrifice, enthusiasm, and tenderness of Christian charity from that same Holy Heart” (page 348).

Blessed Louis Guanella was an Apostle of Prayer whose life was centered on the Heart of Jesus which, in the Eucharist, transformed his own heart. This led to a life of loving service and sacrifice. He lived a Eucharistic life, making an offering of himself with Jesus on behalf of those most forgotten and neglected.

I’m grateful to have discovered this new friend and fellow member of the Apostleship of Prayer.

Penance and Reparation

A group of young Jesuits has been writing a blog called "Whosoever Desires" for almost a year and I recently commented on a post about penance. Here's what I wrote:

Here are a few thoughts on mine on the topic of penance.

1. The 12 Step Program of recovery from alcoholism and addictions includes penance. It's in Steps 8 and 9: "Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others." The person in recovery recognizes that a harm was done and cannot be changed. Making amends is a way of trying to bring balance into the relationship. Even if it is not possible to make amends directly, a person in recovery can do something that, on a spiritual level, brings balance into the broken relationship.

2. The Church has always spoken of "reparation" in conjunction with penance. In my explanations of the traditional formula of the Morning Offering I like to explain "reparation" as "repairing the damage" that sin has caused.

Pope Benedict XVI, in his second encyclical "Spe Salvi," wrote about justice, reparation, and grace in Numbers 42-44. Quoting Theodor Adorno of the Frankfort School, he wrote that "true justice--would require a world 'where not only present suffering would be wiped out, but also that which is irrevocably past would be undone.'"

How is that possible? Only, as was pointed out in the "Whosoever Desires" post, on the Cross. The Holy Father continues: "God now reveals his true face in the figure of the sufferer who shares man's God-forsaken condition by taking it upon himself. This innocent sufferer has attained the certitude of hope: there is a God, and God can create justice in a way that we cannot conceive, yet we can begin to grasp it through faith. Yes, there is a resurrection of the flesh. There is justice. There is an 'undoing' of past suffering, a reparation that sets things right."

In the next paragraph, Pope Benedict elaborates on this mystery: "God is justice and creates justice. This is our consolation and our hope. And in his justice there is also grace. This we know by turning our gaze to the crucified and risen Christ. Both these things--justice and grace--must be seen in their correct inner relationship. Grace does not cancel out justice. It does not make wrong into right. It is not a sponge which wipes everything away, so that whatever someone has done on earth ends up being of equal value."

As members of the Body of Christ, we continue the work of repairing the damage that sin has caused by sharing somehow in the mystery of the Cross. or, as St. Paul wrote to the Colossians: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church..." (1: 24). In most cases the work of reparation will involve "offering up" the suffering that is an inevitable part of human life.

3. It seems to me that penance is part of all religious traditions and in that way could be called a "spiritual instinct" that all humans, as spiritual beings, have. Penance is a way that we "pray" with our bodies, whether it be through fasting from food or some other ascetical practice. This became clear to me when I worked among the Lakota people of South Dakota and witnessed the "inipi" or sweat lodge where the participants offered their discomfort and suffering as an intercessory prayer for individuals and the tribe. There was a strong sense of "communion" as participants would pray "Mitakuye Oyasin" ("All my relatives") and seek, through their personal purification, the good of their families, friends, and all creation.

Faith in Recovery

Last night I went to St. Mary of the Hill Parish to speak to their "Faith in Recovery" group. What is "Faith in Recovery"? They describe themselves as "A Mental Health Ministry in Faith Communities." There are a number of groups that meet throughout the Milwaukee area.

The title of my talk was "Can Suffering Have Any Value?" and the ad for the talk described it as follows:

"Suffering can be mental, physical, or due to circumstances in our lives such as job loss, broken relationships, stress and anxiety. The world approaches suffering as having no value. How can we have a balanced approach to suffering? Does our Christian faith give us an answer to this question? What about the spirituality of 'offering up' suffering?"

One of the goals of "Faith in Recovery" is to help people understand mental illness. One of their brochures has the following facts: 1) "mental illness is far more common than cancer, diabetes, heart disease or arthritis;" 2) "more hospital beds are occupied by people with serious mental illnesses than with any other disease;" 3) "it is estimated that 1 in every 4 families is affected by mental illness."

My family is among the 25% that has been affected by mental illness.

I began my presentation talking about my family and how my oldest sister Judy struggled for years with a dependency on pain-killers. Both of my parents died of cancer, my mother when she was 68 and my father when he was 75. When my sister turned 60 she developed a terrible anxiety that she too was going to suffer and then die of cancer. She was so afraid of dying of cancer that she could no longer face living. In early 2003 she went through a series of 13 electroshock treatments. On December 23, 2003, she put a plastic bag over her head and suffocated herself.

Why? That's the question that went through everyone's mind. Of course we knew the immediate answer. She couldn't kill the pain of her depression and anxiety so she killed herself. But why was this illness of hers "terminal?" Why couldn't she get better? Why didn't God answer all our prayers for her the way we wanted them answered? Why, as the title of the book goes, "Why do bad things happen to good people?"

It seems easier to deal with physical illnesses and the deaths they cause. We don't blame the person with cancer, unless he or she was a smoker. We don't tell them to just work a little harder and they'll get better. Somehow the illnesses of the mind don't receive the same sympathy. We tend to blame the person who is depressed and expect that if they just tried harder they could get better. We don't get angry at the person with cancer, but we easily slip into anger at the person with a mental illness. We don't tell the cancer patient to get over their symptoms and we feel sorry for them when they experience bad side effects from their medications and treatment. We don't have the same sympathy for the mentally ill; we expect them to use will-power to get over their symptoms and we try to ignore the side effects of their medication.

I can't help thinking that Fr. Gerard Manley Hopkins, a Jesuit poet of the Nineteenth Century, struggled with depression and/or spiritual desolation, perhaps "the dark night of the soul." Some of his verses certainly describe what people who struggle with an illness of the mind feel.

In one sonnet, he writes:

"O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall
Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap
May who ne'er hung there.

Those who struggle with mental illness know the mountains of the mind and how dangerous they can be. At times they hang, as it were, by a thread over a precipice. Those of us who have not struggled in this way have a hard time understanding.

Another among what are known as "The Terrible Sonnets," captures the experience of darkness and despair and the silence of God.

"I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day,
What hours, O what black hours we have spent
This night! what sights you, heart, saw; ways you went!
And more must yet, in longer light's delay.
With witness I speak this. But where I say
Hours I mean years, mean life. And my lament
Is cries countless, cries like dead letters sent
To dearest him that lives alas! away.

How does the poet deal with this? How does he try to deal with himself?

"My own heart let me more have pity on; let
Me live to my sad self hereafter kind,
Charitable; not live this tormented mind
With this tormented mind tormenting yet.

Illness, pain, suffering--these lead us to ask "Why?" But there is no satisfactory answer. It is a mystery in the truest sense of that word. Not something we will understand this side of eternity. And suffering is inevitable in everyone's life, but we have a choice in how we deal with it. I offered three suggestions that I have found helpful.

First, the Serenity Prayer: "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference." Basically this is a prayer of acceptance. It leads us to accept suffering when it comes and cannot be avoided instead of reacting with resentment, blame, self-pity, or denial. Acceptance doesn't take away the pain, but it can lead to inner peace.

Second, the 12 Step spirituality of recovery programs. The 12 Steps of AA are not just for alcoholics, drug or sex addicts, over-eaters, or the spouses, children, and friends of them. They're for everyone. Bill W., the author of the 12 Steps and founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, used the 12 Steps to deal with a compulsion to drink that was out of control. After some time of sobriety he ended up facing a new challenge--depression. He came to realize that he could use the same program that got him sober and helped him maintain sobriety to deal with depression. He wrote an article about this called "The Next Frontier: Emotional Sobriety."

Third, the Apostleship of Prayer. At the beginning, in 1844, the Jesuit seminarians learned to make a prayerful offering of their frustrations and sufferings. In this way they found meaning and purpose in them. Years later Dr. Victor Frankl, a Jewish psychiatrist who survived Auschwitz, wrote a book about his experience entitled "Man's Search for Meaning." He concluded that under the terrible conditions of a concentration camp, people didn't survive simply to survive. Those who survived generally had a purpose that transcended mere physical survival. They were committed to surviving for a greater purpose that transcended themselves--a family, a research project, a work of art, God.

Ultimately the secret of the Apostleship of Prayer is that the pains and sufferings we meet in life can have value. It's the value of prayer which, when joined to sacrifice, becomes most like the prayer of Jesus. To offer up the pains and sufferings that come our way helps us find light in darkness. It helps us to trust that even when all we have to offer is our pain, we are doing a great work because it's joined to the work that Jesus accomplished on the Cross when He saved the world.