Asking the Right Question
I have been so moved this past few weeks, as I approach my 40th birthday. To answer your question, “no, it doesn’t feel any different… I’m still the same person” and yet “yes, I am a different person, so much has happened in my life and I have grown so much, Praise God”.
But this year, instead of just letting this day pass without reflection, I have been just going through my whole life and taking another look at it. And as I go through the years in my memory and in my mind, I find that there are two questions that I find myself asking…
One of these questions, leads me to bitterness and resentment… but the other fills me with joy and gratitude.
And I’m coming to realize just how powerful these two questions are and how important it is for us to ask the right question.
Now normally in my homilies, I try to speak the truth to you, but today I want to take a moment to speak some lies. And I want to be sensitive, because each of us are on a journey, and for some these words may resonate in places where there has been real pain and real suffering and I want to honor that. And so ask the Holy Spirit, the comforter, to come along side us and be with us on this journey.
Come Holy Spirit…
…
In praying with the Man Born Blind in today’s Gospel, in my imagination, I put myself in his life and I felt like I could hear these whispers:
Why am I like this? What am I doing wrong? I’m so useless. I wish I wasn’t born this way. What’s wrong with me? It’s my fault. It’s my fault my family is suffering. I should have known better. If only I was different. If only I did something different. I’m always messing things up. If only I could get rid of this part of who I am, I would be so much happier. If I wasn’t this way, my parents would be happier. Nobody wants me. I’m not worth loving.
Things will never get better. Nothing I do helps. This is too good to last. No one understands what I have gone through. If they knew who I really am, they would be disappointed and disgusted. I don’t deserve God’s forgiveness. I am afraid I’ll mess up everything. I’ll never be free of this sin. This is just the way it is. This is just the way I am.
These are just somes of the lies that are whispered into our ears when we are most vulnerable and when we are suffering. Lies of confusion, powerlessness, rejection, hopelessness, abandonment, shame and fear.
And the reality is, that you cannot go through life without experiencing some real sufferings and some pains. Sometimes we can see why they happen, but sometimes there are real tragedies that happen to us. Perhaps we have been abused. Perhaps we have been used. Perhaps we have done things we are not proud of. Perhaps there is an addiction that we can’t break free from. Perhaps there was a sudden death of a loved one. Perhaps your marriage ended in divorce. And perhaps things have happened to you and your family that you had no control over.
Suffering and Pain is unavoidable in this life… because of Original Sin, because of fallen humanity, we all experience hurts, sufferings and even death. And it is easy for the enemy to begin to whisper these lies into our ears, and it’s easy to start to believe these lies. And these lies can lead us to bitterness and resentment. Which is why I think it is important that you remember to ask the right question when you are suffering…
In the Gospel today, Jesus’ disciples, the scribes and Pharisees, they all ask the wrong question:
As Jesus passed by he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
Essentially, who’s fault is it? Who’s to blame? Obviously it’s a sin, they’re thinking, and so someone is to blame. So was it that man’s fault or his parents?
How often in our own lives, when we suffer pains and tragedy, our first question is: Who’s fault is it?
Now I don’t want to say that we ignore people’s responsibility in suffering and pain, but more often than not, this is the only question we ask.
Yet Jesus’ response to the question, “who’s fault is it?” is so spiritually powerful. He says, “Neither he nor his parents sinned; it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him.”
Essentially, it’s not about who’s fault it is that this man was born blind, but it’s about what God will do with that blindness. St. Paul to the Romans says, “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.” (Rm 8:28)
As I look back on my life, every suffering, every pain and loss, over time, surrendered to God was transformed into something truly good and beautiful. Sometimes it took me a while to let go of my grasp on it and surrender it to God, but when I did, man what freedom, what joy, what peace!
Brothers and sisters, I don’t know what has happened in your life. I don’t know what sufferings and pains you carry within you and for how long.
What I do know is this: Asking “Who’s fault was it?” will not bring us peace and communion. In fact, it brings the opposite. It brings hate and contempt. And this world is constantly looking for who’s to blame. Who should I hate for this suffering and evil in the world? Who should I hold in contempt for this? We blame others, we blame God, we even blame ourselves…
But blame and hate doesn’t heal, but only brings more division and more brokenness.
The question we must be asking ourselves is this: “God, what will you do with this?”
Sometimes we can be so blinded by the lies, so blinded by hate (hating others, hating ourselves) that we cannot see anything good that can come from our pain. And although God does not make us suffer, God can take all things and transform it to good.
Jesus Christ first showed how that happens on the cross… Think about it, God took the greed and betrayal of Judas, one of his closest friends, the envy and hatred of the chief priests and scribes, the fear of the disciples, the cynicism of Herod, the cowardice of Pilate and the inhumane cruelty of the Romans and was stripped naked and nailed to the cross only to be mocked and laughed at.
Surely, surely there’s no way that can ever be seen as a good thing.
Yet here we are… When I look at the cross, I am filled with love. His love for me. And it’s beautiful. It doesn’t at all excuse all the horrific things that happened, it doesn’t blot out the real suffering that he suffered and the heartache he felt… but through the grace of God, I see a love that is so real that death cannot even kill. And I am filled with joy and gratitude.
Don’t ask, who’s fault is it? Ask, “God, what will you do with this?”
Jesus, if you can do that, with all that they did to you, with all that suffering and pain… if you can transform all of that into love… surely, surely you can do that with my suffering and my pain. Lord God, I offer you all of me, I offer you all the suffering, all the pains, all the joys, everything… show me what you will do with this… show me your grace, show me your love… Open my eyes Lord, I want to see. I want to see what you see.
