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Continuation of Commentaries
on the Maxims on Love of St. John of the Cross
by Fr. Bruno Cocuzzi, ocd
Maxim 48, Part I
The purest suffering produces the purest understanding.
Once again we have to begin our
commentary by reflecting upon the meanings of the key words in this Maxim, and
hope that in the process of getting at what St. John of the Cross means by those
key words, we will then get to know the truth he is conveying by this
Maxim. We also observe, once again,
that this is not a Maxim in the strict sense, which is an admonition or a
recommended rule of conduct, but a statement of fact. So, once we have grasped the truth of
this Maxim, we may also derive insight into how we might enter into purest
suffering, so as to enjoy its fruit:
purest understanding.
Our task, then, is: First, to form as complete an idea as
possible of what suffering is; second to do the same for
understanding, then third and fourth to inquire into the meaning
of purest suffering and purest
understanding.
Despite the fact that we all
know by experience what it is to suffer, I think we do well if we try to
identify what it is that all forms of suffering have in common, so that we will
have an intellectual appreciation of suffering to go with our experiential,
non-verbal knowledge of suffering.
Already in these commentaries
we have had occasion to speak of the various kinds of suffering: physical and psychological or emotional
suffering. And although
psychological or emotional suffering is spiritual in nature, I think we can also
speak of another kind of spiritual suffering that is supernatural, and which is
experienced by someone who lives a supernatural, that is, divine life thru the
supernatural, Theological Virtues of Faith, Hope and
Charity.
We all know that physical
suffering is experienced as pain.
And we all know what causes physical pain. It is the fact that our bodies have been
afflicted with some kind of disorder.
The disorder may be a wound that has damaged limbs, or muscle tissue, or
organs. The disorder may be a
disease which impedes or diminishes the proper functioning of organs vital to
healthy, bodily life. Again, there
may be physical suffering caused by disorders that are the result of the body
and its constituent elements just wearing out due to old age, and suffering
caused by disorders that defy detection, as in the case of migraine
headaches. Finally, there is
physical suffering caused by the lack of things needed either to nourish
and give energy to the body, or needed to keep the body comfortable, i.e., free
of pain or discomfort. Examples of
the first are hunger, thirst and fatigue or weakness. Examples of the latter are cold,
excessive heat, darkness, excessive noise, offensive odors, bitterness, itching
and chafing.
Then there are physical
disorders that do not give rise to physical pain, but do deprive the body of
normal, natural functioning.
Examples of this are:
blindness, deafness and loss of one or more limbs. Still another would be paralysis of one
or more limbs, even though these limbs remain intact. The suffering due to this kind of
physical disorder introduces us to the next category of suffering, which we will
call natural spiritual suffering, which is psychological/emotional
suffering. The suffering associated
with loss of physical bodily integrity stems from a person's awareness of
his/her abnormal physical state, and from awareness of how they are perceived by
people who enjoy bodily integrity and normal, physical functioning of the
body. Suffering also can stem from
the awareness of being unable to engage in the many enjoyable and rewarding
activities that are open to
normal, able-bodied people. So
already we are talking about psychological/emotional
suffering.
True suffering of this next
category, however, is that which afflicts people who do not suffer because of
the physical disorders we have already mentioned. But we can get a handle on what it is by
using an analogy to ordinary, normal physical health and function. Namely, the concept of psychic
health. A person who enjoys normal
psychic health does not experience psychological/emotional suffering. Normal psychic health is characterized
by what we call "being in good spirits" or having "good morale." And this in turn is made up of a complex
of states of soul. These states of
soul would be identified with feelings or emotions. It seems to me that the following must
all be present for normal psychic health:
serenity, confidence, security, contentment, cheerfulness, optimism,
friendliness, zest for life/enthusiasm.
In addition, these states of soul would have to be a stable, underlying
base out of which a person goes about his daily round of activities, even
though events occur now and then which ruffle the surface of his soul, so to
speak. As feelings and emotions,
these states of soul would differ from the faculties of the soul and the virtues
that perfect the individual as human beings and as children of God by
adoption.
But the two are related, that
is, feelings/emotions and faculties and virtues because the healthy psyche we
have described above is the direct result of an awareness that one has the sound
faculties and the virtues necessary to enter into satisfactory and rewarding
relationships with other people. On
the other hand, psychological/emotional suffering would spring from the
awareness that one does not have the sound faculties or the virtues necessary to
function as a normal rational and social being. This awareness would be made known by
feelings/emotions that are the opposites of the states of soul characteristic of
a person enjoying good psychic health, and these feelings, in turn, would be the
result of unsatisfactory and unrewarding personal relationships. The opposites then would be: restlessness (lack of serenity),
fear/timidity (lack of confidence), worry/anxiety (lack of security),
discontent( lack of contentment), sadness (lack of cheerfulness), pessimism
(lack of optimism), hostility/anger (lack of friendliness), and discouragement
(lack of zest for life/enthusiasm).
These feelings/emotions constitute suffering because they are the signs
of disorder/abnormality in the soul/psyche and which we identified above with
defective faculties and want of virtue.
Instead of the virtues the soul would have bad habits and disordered
tendencies. Such suffering would
run the gamut from slight to severe, depending upon the intensity and extent to
which these feelings/emotions are experienced.
And just as with physical
suffering, there are some psychological/emotional forms of suffering that are
caused by the insufficiency or the absence of perceptions that feed and sustain
a healthy psyche, or the presence of perceptions that are unpleasant and
offensive to the human psyche. Thus
the health of the psyche is sustained by the perception that one is esteemed and
respected by others, both as one is as and of him or her self, or as a member of
society that makes valuable contributions to the common good. The experiences unpleasant to, and
capable of hurting, the human psyche would be the experience of being unwanted,
unloved, unappreciated, unrecognized, and the offensive perceptions capable of
wounding and crippling the human psyche would be those of being despised and
insulted, ridiculed and persecuted.
I think that sufficiently covers what constitutes psychological/emotional
suffering, which we have labeled natural/spiritual, except that we can suffer
all the above by compassion, as when loved ones are so afflicted.
Let us now turn our attention
to what we will call supernatural/spiritual suffering. As we said earlier, this kind of
suffering has to do with our souls (and our persons) insofar as they have been
transformed by Sanctifying Grace, so that we become children of God by
adoption. We live our created
participation in the Life of God in virtue of the Theological/Supernatural
virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity.
When Faith, Hope and Charity in us are damaged or wounded, we would
expect to experience spiritual/supernatural suffering.
We have had occasion already to
touch upon the spiritual/supernatural health of a child of God by adoption
where, in a previous conference we saw that a soul is sick when it cannot keep
from committing (or doesn't want to stop committing) deliberate venial
sins. We said at that time, too,
that a soul that cannot stop (or does not want to stop) committing mortal sin is
spiritually/supernaturally dead. We
saw, further, that that is because venial sins diminish the fervor of charity,
and mortal sin drives out charity, and thus kills the Life of God in our
souls.
It would follow, then, that
just as charity can be damaged and diminished, so also Faith and Hope would be
susceptible to damage and weakening.
But, unfortunately, damage to our supernatural organism that results from
defective or ailing Faith, Hope and Charity is not always experienced as
pain or sorrow. There is nothing
more abnormal and more deplorable than a baptized person who is
devoid of Faith, Hope and Charity, yet folks who have killed these virtues in
their soul may not be experiencing any symptoms of grief or sorrow. It is even possible that these folks may
have all the states of soul that we said were typical of someone who was
enjoying a healthy psychic life, and thus would not be aware that they are
spiritually/supernaturally dead.
And if it so happened that on occasion they may experience the feeling
that something important and vital is lacking in their lives, they would tend to
attribute that to the fact that they don't have enough wealth or power, or
prestige, or sex, or other forms of pleasure and control.
It seems then, that only they
suffer in a supernatural/spiritual way who are already living and enjoying a
vigorous and fervent participation in the Life of God in virtue of vigorous and
fervent Faith, Hope and Charity. In
other words, the more one has advanced in holiness, the more keenly he can
experience supernatural/spiritual suffering.
One form of
supernatural/spiritual suffering is called "contrition." It means that one feels
crushed and is sorrowing because one knows that he or she has
offended God, who is all Good and deserving of all one's love. The soul suffers because of the
awareness that it has damaged its relationship with God, and with its fellow
human creatures too, for that matter.
Regarding those whose Faith, Hope and Charity is weak, not vigorous or
fervent, we speak of attrition.
Attrition does not result in a felt sorrow or feeling of
being crushed because it is based upon a mere intellectual apprehension
that one has offended God or one's fellow human creatures. In this situation, though weak, Faith,
Hope and Charity suffice to bring such a soul to confession and so keep it alive
with the Life of God in Sanctifying Grace.
Having seen how damage done to
Charity causes supernatural suffering in a holy soul, we have to ask: How and when does a holy person
experience supernatural suffering when damage is done to its Faith and
Hope?
With regard to Faith, we find
the answer by turning to the experience of St. Therese of the Child Jesus during
the last year and seven months of her life. During that entire time she suffered
excruciating psychological torment because she had lost, or rather, God had seen
fit to deprive her of the certitude of His existence and presence, of an
after-life, and of the eternal bliss in Heaven that awaits faithful souls. In other words, a holy person suffers
when he or she is assailed by doubts concerning any or all of the Truths of our
Catholic Religion. All of us know
what a grievous suffering it is to have doubts about what we ought to do, how we
ought to conduct ourselves, what decisions to make concerning our human lives on
earth. We know what excruciating
torment it is, psychologically, when we suspect that someone we love dearly has
betrayed us or has contempt for us and our love. That knowledge, whether we have
experienced it personally or know others who have experienced it personally
gives us a very good and vivid appreciation of what a holy soul experiences when
God allows that soul to undergo grievous trials of Faith by allowing it to be assailed by
grievous doubts.
With regard to Hope, we can
find an answer by considering what it is that is related to Hope the way doubt
and suspicion are related to Faith and certitude. It seems to me that the analogous state
of soul to those two would be discouragement, or perhaps better, temptations to
despair. That is because Hope
supplies the strength and the power to rely upon God and His attributes for all
that we need to overcome sin and evil in ourselves and in the world so as to
come to eternal life and happiness.
Temptations against Hope, or what damages the theological Virtue of Hope,
are the feelings that those attributes of God are not available, or are perhaps
not sufficient to save the soul from being overpowered and destroyed by sin and
evil. The reason I say
temptations to despair rather than feelings of despair is because
despair is only possible in very proud people, so that great pride and holiness
are mutually exclusive. Very proud
people are likely to despair because their pride causes them to think that,
because they are so superior, God's mercy is not capable of forgiving sins as
great as theirs. They think God's
Mercy and forgiveness are not equal to the magnitude if their guilt. With holy souls who are tempted
to think and perhaps even feel that God's saving graces are not there for them
when they need it, the causes of those feelings and temptations would be other
than pride. Perhaps the reason we
seldom hear of great saints suffering trials against Hope analogous to their
trials against Faith is because holy souls are very humble, put all their trust
in God and never rely upon themselves or anything other than God. Perhaps the closest to such trials of
Hope would be the feeling that one is abandoned by God, which some
great saints have experienced, as did Jesus Himself on the
Cross.
Again, finally, after
considering how experiences or feelings that tend to wound or damage or diminish
Faith, Hope and Charity, we can consider supernatural/spiritual sufferings that
are caused, not by wounds inflicted, but by a very holy life: sufferings
experienced by people very very closely united to God, to Jesus, in Love. This suffering comes from the knowledge
that God and Jesus are not loved as they deserve, from seeing that souls are
being lost, from seeing the suffering inflicted upon bodies and souls of people
by sin and evil, from seeing the Church under attack and persecuted, from seeing
Faith, Hope and charity in Christians destroyed by agencies and agents that
promote error and falsehood in doctrine and moral teaching. This kind of suffering can be compared
to a martyrdom. This is the kind of
suffering that wounds and grieves the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate
Heart of the Blessed ever-Virgin Mary.
Now, before leaving this topic
of the various kinds of suffering, we must try to identify what it is that ALL
forms of suffering have in common, as we proposed at the beginning of this
conference. I do believe that we
find it in the truth that all suffering is something that our humanity DOES NOT
WANT to experience. Suffering
consists of all experiences that are repugnant to our human
nature.
To understand this better we
have to resort again to speaking about DRUTHERS. It so happens that the material and
spiritual components of our humanity have their respective DRUTHERS. The body doesn't want to
experience pain, and the psyche doesn't want to experience sorrow and
grief. Even the supernatural
organism established in us by Sanctifying Grace has its druthers, provided, of
course, it is firmly united to God in Holiness. Our supernatural being doesn't
want to see God offended in the least way; it doesn't want to see a single
soul lose its eternal salvation.
These things cause a holy person dreadful
suffering.
Perhaps I am too mild in saying
that all three of the above aspects of our humanity, physical, psychical and
supernatural, would rather not undergo their respective forms of
suffering. Ordinarily, those forms
of suffering are so dreaded by us, by people in general, that we are inclined to
seek out and use all possible means to avoid those pains and that grief. And if we are already experiencing them,
they incline us to seek and use all possible means of ridding ourselves of those
sufferings by destroying whatever it is that causes them.
In saying that these three
distinct levels of druthers incline us to seek means of avoiding or
overcoming the causes of the three respective kinds of suffering, we are
acknowledging that these druthers are normal and morally neutral in each
and everyone of us. We always
remain free to yield to their respective urgings or not yield. How we freely choose to follow
them or ignore them then become acts for which we are morally
answerable. Choices that are in
accord with God's will for us as His human children and as His children
by adoption are good and deserving of a divine reward. What free choices we make that are
not in accord with His Will for us, as known by Faith, are sinful and
deserving of punishment, one immediate form of punishment is that sinful choices
either diminish or destroy God's life in our souls.
Having thus used up 14+ of
these handwritten pages to get a handle on all that is included in the word
SUFFERING, we will use the next conference to reflect upon the
meaning of the word understanding, and then upon what is meant by
purest suffering and purest understanding.
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