Word of Life

March 2005

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matt 27:46)

If there is an element of mystery in our lives, it is suffering. We would like to avoid it but, sooner or later, suffering always comes. From an ordinary headache that seems to spoil our simplest daily activities to the heartache when a son or a daughter takes the wrong path; from a mistake at work to a car accident that kills a close friend or relative; from failing an exam to the horror of war, terrorism, and natural disasters.
We often feel powerless in the face of suffering. Even people close to us who love us are often unable to help put things right: although sometimes it is enough that someone shares our pain with us, perhaps in silence. This is what Jesus did: he drew close to every man and every woman to the point of sharing all that is ours. He did even more: he took upon himself every one of our sufferings and made himself suffering with us, to the point of crying out:

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
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It was three o’clock in the afternoon when Jesus hurled this cry towards heaven. For three long hours he had hung on the cross, nailed hands and feet. He had lived his short life in one continuous act of self-giving. He had healed the sick and raised the dead, he had multiplied the loaves of bread and forgiven sinners, and he had spoken words of wisdom and of life.

Moreover, while on the cross, he forgave those who crucified him, opened the gates of heaven to the good thief and gave his body and blood for us, having already given them to us in the Eucharist. Then he cried out:

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

But Jesus did not let himself be overcome by suffering. As if by a divine alchemy, he transformed it into love, into life. In fact, just when he seemed to experience infinite distance from the Father, with an enormous and unimaginable effort Jesus believed in God’s love and entrusted himself completely to God: "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit" (Luke 23:46).

Jesus re-established unity between heaven and earth and opened for us the gates to the kingdom of God. He made us fully children of God and brothers and sisters of one another.

This is the mystery of death and of life that we celebrate at Easter, the feast of the resurrection.

It is the same mystery that was experienced in all its fullness by Mary, the first disciple of Jesus. At the foot of the cross she too was called to ‘lose’ what she held most dear, her Son, God. But in that moment, as many would say, precisely because she accepted God’s plan, she became the Mother of many children, our Mother.

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Through his infinite pain, the price of our redemption, Jesus made himself one with us in all things, taking onto himself our tiredness, our disillusionments, our lack of direction, and our failures; and he teaches us how to live.

If he took on all the pains, divisions, traumas of humanity, wherever I see suffering, in myself or in my brothers and sisters, I see Jesus. Every physical, moral, or spiritual pain reminds me of him; each carries his presence, is one of his faces.

I can say: “In this pain I love you, Jesus forsaken. It is you, who have made my pain yours, who come to visit me. So I want you, I embrace you!”

If we take care then to love, to respond to his grace, to want what God wants from us in the next present moment, to live our life for him, we will often find that the suffering disappears. This is because love calls down the gifts of the Spirit: joy, light and peace. Shining in us is the Risen Lord.

Chiara Lubich

 

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