Blaming God for sufferings

With recent prophecies so terrible, how do we cope?

Theodicy, which is an attempt to reconcile sufferings and an omnipotent and loving God, often ends insufficiently for one who has just lost a loved one, especially under circumstances so tragic as to drive one to ask whether God even exists.

Sympathizers attempt to assuage by telling the bereaved that the departed is after all already in Heaven, or that all is part of God’s plans. I doubt such declarations take root. No, there remains bitterness, a blaming of God for lack of love.

Neither have philosophers, who have come out with assorted explanations why sufferings befall mankind, have not been as comforting to the vast majority who can’t absorb their syllogisms as against sufferings felt here and now.

I have always felt it must be grace that some people readily reconcile themselves with sufferings. It’s a gift from God who permits misfortune, for reasons to be fully understood only in the next life.

Complementing grace is faith based on the premise that God is perfect and therefore can not be cruel; it must be that God has allowed pain because, ultimately, a higher good for all would result.

So it’s okay for the bereaved to comfort themselves with the thought that their departed loved one is at peace and in a better place. It is said that given the option to return to life on earth, those in Purgatory would prefer their purgatorial state because of certainty that they would eventually land in Heaven. It’s another story, however, for those who land in hell.

God certainly knew many would tend to blame Him for sufferings of various magnitudes. So also, and this is perhaps the best way of understanding our personal pains, God the Son, Jesus Christ, assumed human flesh and allow Himself, with the same vulnerability of ordinary humans, to experience horrible pain that finally led to agonizing death on the cross.

In her apparitions, the Blessed Mother has often stressed that there is Heaven and that is where we’re supposed to direct ourselves. Faith in Heaven, in life everlasting, will be a major source of strength in the apocalyptic times to come. It is a thought that can make

temporal sufferings not only tolerable, but even meaningful in the context of the way of the cross,

Saints, in their lifetimes, took Jesus’way of the cross, the narrow path. Some chose to become “victim souls” to bear the cross of those who understand less, to expiate for their sins, a restoration demanded by Divine Justice. It’s something like a father or mother carrying all the burdens of parenthood for the good of their children.

Sometimes, Adam and Eve are blamed, perhaps rightly, for the imbalance they created for eating the apple, for otherwise, mankind would still probably be living in Paradise, without need to work hard for food, without the need for mothers to bear the pain of birthing. But that’s another issue requiring more space. From them, however, is learned the lesson of Divine Justice: all are affected by the transgression of each.

So we shift, as usual, to recent messages from Heaven, as conveyed through believable mystics.

Last July 25, the Blessed Mother relayed the following message via a visionary from Medjugorje:

“Dear children! In this peaceless time in which the devil is reaping souls to draw them to himself, I am calling you to persevering prayer, so that in prayer you discover the God of love and hope. Little children, take the Cross in your hands. May it be your encouragement for love to always win, in a special way now when the Cross and faith are rejected. You be a reflection and an example with your lives that faith and hope are still alive and a new world of peace is possible. I am with you and intercede for you before my Son, Jesus. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

Also last July 25, the Blessed Mother also told mystic Gisella Car d i a:

“Dear children, thank you for being gathered here in prayer and for having listened to my call in your hearts. Beloved children, continue every day in prayer, especially in the recitation of the Holy Rosary which is the sole protection that you will have against evil. Children, look around you: earthquakes, tsunamis, devastating storms will not stop – only prayer recited with the heart can change things, but everything must be fulfilled, because that is how it has been written.

“Abandon your will and always be in the will of God. You are accustomed to living a mechanical life: abandon the things of earth and have more consideration for the things of heaven, because only thus will you be able to walk along the more difficult but more correct path. Pay attention, children, do not fall into the devil’s trap: I love you and I want you to be saved. I would like my army of light to be able to unite in one voice. Now I leave you with my holy blessing in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.”