All those little difficulties. . . .
Sarah at "Just another day of Catholic pondering" was musing on The Breaks today and reminded me of a reflection on the Agony of Christ in the Garden, the first of the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary by Fr. Didier-Marie.
"Jesus comes to meet each one of us in our misery to transform our human misery into the divine mystery of love. Jesus does not come to destroy our suffering, but to transform it profoundly so that it may not be ours any more but that it may be a path to enter in His divine life. . . ."
Christ was, as Sarah so aptly reminds us, distinctly aware of the sufferings of daily life. His humanity was complete. He suffers with us, just as a father suffers with his children when he sees them hurt by others. We have the tendency sometimes to minimize our concerns, the stresses we endure, comparing them to those of others or to the sufferings of Christ, but this denies Christ the opportunity to transform our lives in the smallest moments, in the moments when we may need Him the most. What may be insignificant to others but significiant to us is significant to Christ. They give Him an opportunity not only to manifest His great love for us, but also to teach us about humility.
Father Didier-Marie continues, reflecting on the Scourging and the Crowning of Thorns:
"Jesus in the Scourging and the Crowning of Thorns comes to encounter those daily miseries that each of us experience in our days, all those little difficulties that make the day sometimes very heavy, that sometime make us lose our joy, lose our hope. Jesus comes in our scourging, in our crowning of thorns, each time that we experience a humiliation to help us to discover in that humiliation His humble heart. [He says,] 'Learn from me for I am gentle and humble of heart'. . . ."
These reflections really drive home the deep love of Christ for us. He takes each of our own sorrows and miseries, no matter how small, into His sacred heart. He bids us to lay our heads on His heart and allow Him to apply the salve of His love and mercy intp the deepest wounds of our souls. At the same time He teaches us gentleness and humility. Seeing the effect that these "little" difficulties can have on us, that we can sometimes lose the inner peace and focus on Christ that we seek reminds us just how in need of His Love and Mercy we are.
The Love shown at the cross and the humiliation of Christ's burial are reminders of the limitlessness of Christ's love for each of us. We must always remember that in the little difficulties of the day or in the darkest night of the soul that: "Our backs might be pressed to the wood of our cross, but our heads are always resting on the outstretched arms of our God who was lying there before us." We are never abandoned.
"Jesus comes to meet each one of us in our misery to transform our human misery into the divine mystery of love. Jesus does not come to destroy our suffering, but to transform it profoundly so that it may not be ours any more but that it may be a path to enter in His divine life. . . ."
Christ was, as Sarah so aptly reminds us, distinctly aware of the sufferings of daily life. His humanity was complete. He suffers with us, just as a father suffers with his children when he sees them hurt by others. We have the tendency sometimes to minimize our concerns, the stresses we endure, comparing them to those of others or to the sufferings of Christ, but this denies Christ the opportunity to transform our lives in the smallest moments, in the moments when we may need Him the most. What may be insignificant to others but significiant to us is significant to Christ. They give Him an opportunity not only to manifest His great love for us, but also to teach us about humility.
Father Didier-Marie continues, reflecting on the Scourging and the Crowning of Thorns:
"Jesus in the Scourging and the Crowning of Thorns comes to encounter those daily miseries that each of us experience in our days, all those little difficulties that make the day sometimes very heavy, that sometime make us lose our joy, lose our hope. Jesus comes in our scourging, in our crowning of thorns, each time that we experience a humiliation to help us to discover in that humiliation His humble heart. [He says,] 'Learn from me for I am gentle and humble of heart'. . . ."
These reflections really drive home the deep love of Christ for us. He takes each of our own sorrows and miseries, no matter how small, into His sacred heart. He bids us to lay our heads on His heart and allow Him to apply the salve of His love and mercy intp the deepest wounds of our souls. At the same time He teaches us gentleness and humility. Seeing the effect that these "little" difficulties can have on us, that we can sometimes lose the inner peace and focus on Christ that we seek reminds us just how in need of His Love and Mercy we are.
The Love shown at the cross and the humiliation of Christ's burial are reminders of the limitlessness of Christ's love for each of us. We must always remember that in the little difficulties of the day or in the darkest night of the soul that: "Our backs might be pressed to the wood of our cross, but our heads are always resting on the outstretched arms of our God who was lying there before us." We are never abandoned.
posted by Daughter of St. John | 3:30 PM
2 Comments:
exactly the words i needed to read right now.
I'm hosting the Catholic Carnival this week. Thought I'd give you a heads up about it in case you wanted to submit a post.
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