Monday, February 4, 2008 at 12:12am
Suffering unto God
Column: God Said What?
What is it that compels us to speak of God?
There are at least as many answers to that question as there are religions to ask it. Even within the Christian tradition, and in my own Roman Catholic corner of that tradition, we are not of one mind. If you ask a Maryknoll priest in India and an Opus Dei member in the United States, you will get drastically different answers. That's because any answer to this question, in part, depends on one's culture even within a religious tradition.
This is important to remember now that the global face of Christianity is drastically changing. Right now we are continuing to watch a migration of Christianity from the North to the South. That is, from the post-industrial West (Europe, North America and Australia) to the developing world (Africa, Latin America and Asia). Your average Christian today isn't a middle-aged European but perhaps a teenage Asian boy or a young African woman.
Such a change in the cultures within Christianity is going to compel a serious rethinking of how we go about being Christian. Some have even compared this coming change to the seismic shift that accompanied the move from Jewish-Christianity to Greco-Roman Gentile Christianity that was completed at the Councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon in the fourth and fifth centuries. For the record, these were the councils that solidified the earliest church witness of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus into Greek philosophical categories of understanding. This is where the basis of orthodoxy comes from — in particular, the Trinity and the full humanity and divinity of Jesus.
And as Christianity changes, so will theology. And this means we'll have to see that different situations might call for posing different questions. For example, it has been famously pointed out that in the West the question seems to be "Is there a God?" and the answer entails a search for meaning. But in the developing world, the question looks more like "Of course, there's a God — but why is there so much suffering?"
Neither question is fully answerable. But the question of existential meaning is less difficult to explore than the question of unwarranted human suffering. That's because we can explore the question of existential meaning somewhat at our leisure. But we address the question of unwarranted human suffering because it slaps us in the face.
Don't get me wrong, undertaking a quest for existential meaning is necessary. It is part and parcel with a life of trying to live in relation to the God of Jesus Christ. And, as I can attest, the Christian way of life provides powerful, challenging and fruitful layers of meaning in one's life.
But the problem of suffering is more difficult. That's because we know we cannot answer it. As Flemish-Dominican theologian Edward Schillebeeckx has pointed out, in the face of radical evil and suffering there can be no explanation. That's because such realities are irrational. Human reason can do nothing but fall silent when faced with such suffering and evil. And as this happens, we have no other recourse but to protest the existence of such suffering and work concretely for its eradication.
That's the hard truth. We have no good answer to the problem of human suffering. That's because both it and God remain a mystery. A response that I find helpful, however, is found in the spirituality of German-Catholic theologian Johann Baptist Metz. Metz advocated what he called a "mysticism of suffering unto God." That is, a stance in our relationship with God in which we cry out to the divine and demand an accounting for God's absence in the face of such great suffering. As we cry out for God to act, we accept our own responsibility to act decisively to interrupt this suffering and heal the wounded and liberate the oppressed.
Metz's is a theological posture is rooted in the Psalms of Lament, Jesus' cry from the cross in the Gospel of Mark ("My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?") and the absence of God in Exodus 1-2 (when God is hidden while the Hebrews are thrown into slavery and genocide). It is a spirituality that brings us deeper into God's mystery through our own suffering and through our solidarity with that of others. It is in the tradition of what St. John of the Cross called the "dark night of the soul." It allows us to cling to God while confronting God. Even though God is God and we're not.
At the same time, this posture gives us strength to act for life, healing and liberation for those in need. It compels us to act concretely to further the greater good — God's salvation for humankind. Although we receive few answers, this spirituality gives us space to grieve, to protest and to be given renewed strength to work against the root causes of unjust suffering in our world.
A "mysticism of suffering unto God" connects our spirituality to our daily lives, prayer to action, sacraments to social justice. It is what has been called the "mystical-political" life of a follower of Christ. It is the unity between love of God and love of neighbor without losing either. Taking our cue from Jesus, it is a life in which our spirituality and our actions are unified and call each other to account to the God of Life, the God of Jesus Christ who seeks an end to all injustice and evil.
This is a proclamation of God's salvation for humankind. It is one that bellows that God's Reign is now breaking into the world and that the final triumph of good over evil has begun. But this salvation is only fragmentary for now. In the end, though, these glimpses of salvation give us real faith and real hope that God's goodness will prevail.
Our only response to unjust suffering is to resist it and seek its eradication. It is a spirituality of struggle. And it is a real hope in a faithful God who will not allow evil to have the last word, even if God seems to be hidden. It is a Resurrection hope despite all evidence to the contrary.
This hope gives us the strength to love. And love — be it social, political or interpersonal — is a needed response to evil and suffering. I don't know about you, but to me that's good news. And that's a good reason to talk about God.
— — —
Kevin Considine is a graduate student at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, the largest Roman Catholic school of theology and ministry in North America. He is married to a most wonderful woman who keeps him in line and makes sure his thoughts make sense. He and his wife live on the South Side of Chicago. He welcomes comments, feedback or fits of anger and can be reached at {email considkp@yahoo.com}considkp@yahoo.com{/email}. © Copyright 2008 by Kevin Considine
There are at least as many answers to that question as there are religions to ask it. Even within the Christian tradition, and in my own Roman Catholic corner of that tradition, we are not of one mind. If you ask a Maryknoll priest in India and an Opus Dei member in the United States, you will get drastically different answers. That's because any answer to this question, in part, depends on one's culture even within a religious tradition.
This is important to remember now that the global face of Christianity is drastically changing. Right now we are continuing to watch a migration of Christianity from the North to the South. That is, from the post-industrial West (Europe, North America and Australia) to the developing world (Africa, Latin America and Asia). Your average Christian today isn't a middle-aged European but perhaps a teenage Asian boy or a young African woman.
Such a change in the cultures within Christianity is going to compel a serious rethinking of how we go about being Christian. Some have even compared this coming change to the seismic shift that accompanied the move from Jewish-Christianity to Greco-Roman Gentile Christianity that was completed at the Councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon in the fourth and fifth centuries. For the record, these were the councils that solidified the earliest church witness of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus into Greek philosophical categories of understanding. This is where the basis of orthodoxy comes from — in particular, the Trinity and the full humanity and divinity of Jesus.
And as Christianity changes, so will theology. And this means we'll have to see that different situations might call for posing different questions. For example, it has been famously pointed out that in the West the question seems to be "Is there a God?" and the answer entails a search for meaning. But in the developing world, the question looks more like "Of course, there's a God — but why is there so much suffering?"
Neither question is fully answerable. But the question of existential meaning is less difficult to explore than the question of unwarranted human suffering. That's because we can explore the question of existential meaning somewhat at our leisure. But we address the question of unwarranted human suffering because it slaps us in the face.
Don't get me wrong, undertaking a quest for existential meaning is necessary. It is part and parcel with a life of trying to live in relation to the God of Jesus Christ. And, as I can attest, the Christian way of life provides powerful, challenging and fruitful layers of meaning in one's life.
But the problem of suffering is more difficult. That's because we know we cannot answer it. As Flemish-Dominican theologian Edward Schillebeeckx has pointed out, in the face of radical evil and suffering there can be no explanation. That's because such realities are irrational. Human reason can do nothing but fall silent when faced with such suffering and evil. And as this happens, we have no other recourse but to protest the existence of such suffering and work concretely for its eradication.
That's the hard truth. We have no good answer to the problem of human suffering. That's because both it and God remain a mystery. A response that I find helpful, however, is found in the spirituality of German-Catholic theologian Johann Baptist Metz. Metz advocated what he called a "mysticism of suffering unto God." That is, a stance in our relationship with God in which we cry out to the divine and demand an accounting for God's absence in the face of such great suffering. As we cry out for God to act, we accept our own responsibility to act decisively to interrupt this suffering and heal the wounded and liberate the oppressed.
Metz's is a theological posture is rooted in the Psalms of Lament, Jesus' cry from the cross in the Gospel of Mark ("My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?") and the absence of God in Exodus 1-2 (when God is hidden while the Hebrews are thrown into slavery and genocide). It is a spirituality that brings us deeper into God's mystery through our own suffering and through our solidarity with that of others. It is in the tradition of what St. John of the Cross called the "dark night of the soul." It allows us to cling to God while confronting God. Even though God is God and we're not.
At the same time, this posture gives us strength to act for life, healing and liberation for those in need. It compels us to act concretely to further the greater good — God's salvation for humankind. Although we receive few answers, this spirituality gives us space to grieve, to protest and to be given renewed strength to work against the root causes of unjust suffering in our world.
A "mysticism of suffering unto God" connects our spirituality to our daily lives, prayer to action, sacraments to social justice. It is what has been called the "mystical-political" life of a follower of Christ. It is the unity between love of God and love of neighbor without losing either. Taking our cue from Jesus, it is a life in which our spirituality and our actions are unified and call each other to account to the God of Life, the God of Jesus Christ who seeks an end to all injustice and evil.
This is a proclamation of God's salvation for humankind. It is one that bellows that God's Reign is now breaking into the world and that the final triumph of good over evil has begun. But this salvation is only fragmentary for now. In the end, though, these glimpses of salvation give us real faith and real hope that God's goodness will prevail.
Our only response to unjust suffering is to resist it and seek its eradication. It is a spirituality of struggle. And it is a real hope in a faithful God who will not allow evil to have the last word, even if God seems to be hidden. It is a Resurrection hope despite all evidence to the contrary.
This hope gives us the strength to love. And love — be it social, political or interpersonal — is a needed response to evil and suffering. I don't know about you, but to me that's good news. And that's a good reason to talk about God.
— — —
Kevin Considine is a graduate student at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, the largest Roman Catholic school of theology and ministry in North America. He is married to a most wonderful woman who keeps him in line and makes sure his thoughts make sense. He and his wife live on the South Side of Chicago. He welcomes comments, feedback or fits of anger and can be reached at {email considkp@yahoo.com}considkp@yahoo.com{/email}. © Copyright 2008 by Kevin Considine