Fr. Chris - Fourth Sunday of Lent - Homily

“Suffering Which Leads To Light”
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Today is traditionally known as ‘Laetare’ Sunday, but what exactly does that mean?
 
First of all, ‘laetare’ is a latin word which comes from the verb, ‘laetari’, which means ‘to rejoice’. Some may also be familiar with ‘Gaudete’ Sunday, celebrated during Advent, ‘gaudete’ which is also a latin word and which also means to rejoice, but in a more declamatory, exuberant way: Rejoice! Rejoice!
 
But why would we ‘rejoice’ during Advent or especially Lent? It is because it is also traditional to have a ‘break’ midway through these two seasons of penance and self-reflection to consider the ‘light’ which is coming, the light of Christ, Christ who is getting closer and closer to us, nearer and nearer, pushing the darkness away, while bringing his peace, joy, love and good news to the world.
 
Of course, many of us may find it difficult to ‘rejoice’ during current circumstances. The pandemic has and is still weighing upon us physically, emotionally, and mentally. Many have lost loved ones. Many are isolated and alone. Many anxious, angry and fearful in the face of financial worries and employment concerns. In many ways it has been a year of suffering, a penitential year.   
 
But perhaps our response to suffering doesn’t need to be negative. Perhaps it is all in how we view it, understand it, accept it, or even how to embrace it, especially during this time of penance, and self-sacrifice for our good and the good of others.         
 
Viktor Frankl, the famous neurologist, psychiatrist and philosopher who survived life in a concentration camp during the Holocaust once said, after reflecting upon what he and many others had so bitterly suffered, that “Everything can be taken from [humankind], but one thing: our freedom – [the freedom] to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances.”  
 
Physicians tell us suffering is the body’s way of indicating trouble, and so it calls its many members to invoke healing. Christ has also shown us the meaning and value of suffering, that it, too, leads to healing, but healing of our souls.
 
Indeed, the mother who suffers to give birth to new life will tell us suffering is actually a ‘blessing’! We also suffer on earth to bring new life into our own being, healing and purging our souls, and the souls of each other through the mysterious, but divine exchange of what we call ‘redemptive’ suffering. This suffering teaches us strength in adversity, instils a wisdom into our natures, matures us, helps us learn to put each foot forward in front of the other regardless of physical or mental impairment, just as Christ pushed his limits to reach the cross of our salvation.
 
Our suffering in these past many months is indeed a blessing, because the pains both small and great bring us into Christ’s world, a world which is motivated and energized, not by physical strength and prowess, but by an intense, overwhelming love which sparked our birth into this life, we who are God’s most beloved miracle.   
 
Clearly, we can choose the dark, or we can choose the ‘light’. We can dwell on the darkness around us, fear it, even despise it, or we can lift our eyes upward to the top of Calvary, just as Christ did on his painful journey to Golgotha, knowing there is light at the top of the mountain where our suffering in the end redeems us.
 
Suffering is a mystery, but a mystery founded on the love of God. Christ did this for love of us. As 1 Cor 13.7-8 reminds us: “[Love] bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.” Why? Because God is love.   
  
So, let us actually be grateful for the suffering we are enduring, because it is bringing us closer to Christ, the ‘Light’, the same ‘Light’ which wiped away the physical and mental darkness from the heart of Nicodemus, the ‘Light’ who hears our cries in the wilderness and answers them with his sacrifice of love and promise of eternal life.
 
This week’s Lenten Project question is: “Where am I going?”
 
 
– Rev Fr Christopher Tracey, Saint Joseph Parish, Saugeen Shores, Ontario ​