Defending the Faith 11
Opening Prayer
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Lord Jesus Christ,
You entered our suffering,
carried the Cross,
and transformed death by Your Resurrection.
Be close to all who suffer,
strengthen those who are grieving,
and help us to trust the Father
even when we do not understand.
Amen.
In this series, we have been asking some of the questions Catholics are often asked.
Why be Catholic?
Did Jesus really found the Church?
Is the Bible enough?
Who has authority in the Church?
Why do Catholics go to Mass every Sunday?
Is the Eucharist really Jesus?
Why confess sins to a priest?
Why baptise babies?
Why do Catholics honour Mary and the saints?
Why does the Church teach difficult moral truths?
In this session, we come to one of the hardest questions of all:
Why is there suffering if God is good?
This is not just an intellectual question.
It is personal.
It is asked at hospital beds.
It is asked after funerals.
It is asked by parents who have lost children.
It is asked by people living with chronic illness.
It is asked by those who have been hurt, abused, betrayed, or abandoned.
It is asked by people who pray and feel no answer.
It is asked by people who look at war, poverty, cruelty, and disaster and say:
“If God is good, why does He allow this?”
We must answer carefully.
No Christian should answer suffering lightly.
No one should stand beside a grieving person and offer quick explanations.
Some answers may be true, but badly timed.
A person in agony may not need a lecture.
They may need silence, presence, prayer, and love.
Even Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus.
So we begin with humility.
The Catholic faith does not pretend that suffering is small.
It does not pretend evil is harmless.
It does not say pain is imaginary.
It does not say grief is weakness.
It does not say Christians should simply smile through sorrow.
The Catholic faith looks directly at suffering.
And at the centre of our faith is not an explanation written on paper.
At the centre of our faith is a crucified Lord.
Christianity does not answer suffering by saying:
“Pain does not matter.”
Christianity answers suffering by saying:
God Himself has entered it.
1. Suffering was not part of God’s original plan
We must begin with creation.
God made the world good.
God is not the author of evil.
God did not create human beings for misery, sin, disease, hatred, violence, and death.
He created us for life.
For communion.
For love.
For holiness.
For eternal happiness with Him.
The Book of Genesis shows that the world, as God made it, is good.
But it also shows that sin enters through human disobedience.
The harmony between God, humanity, creation, and the human heart is wounded.
From that wound comes disorder.
Sin.
Shame.
Division.
Violence.
Death.
This matters.
When Catholics speak about suffering, we do not say:
“This is exactly how God wanted the world to be.”
No.
Suffering is connected with a fallen world.
The world is good, but wounded.
Human beings are good, but wounded.
Creation is good, but groaning.
Something has gone wrong.
That is why suffering feels wrong to us.
We grieve because death is an enemy.
We are shocked by cruelty because evil is not normal.
We ache for justice because we were made for goodness.
The fact that suffering troubles us is itself a sign that we were made for more than suffering.
Deep down, we know that pain, death, and evil are not the final truth about reality.
God made us for life.
And the whole story of salvation is God’s work to rescue, heal, and restore what sin has wounded.
2. God permits evil, but He does not love evil
This is a very important distinction.
God permits evil.
But God does not love evil.
God permits suffering.
But He does not delight in suffering.
God allows sin.
But He does not approve of sin.
Sometimes people imagine God as though He were directly causing every tragedy.
As though God looks at a child’s illness, a violent act, or a terrible accident and says:
“I wanted that.”
That is not how we should think.
God is sovereign.
Nothing happens outside His knowledge or permission.
But His permission is not the same as His approval.
Human beings have real freedom.
And because freedom is real, love is possible.
But if freedom is real, sin is also possible.
A world where no one could choose evil would also be a world where no one could freely love.
God could have made creatures like machines.
But machines do not love.
Love requires freedom.
And freedom can be misused.
Much suffering comes from the misuse of human freedom: violence, selfishness, greed, neglect, abuse, injustice, war, betrayal.
God does not love those things.
He hates sin.
He calls us to repentance.
He commands justice.
He defends the poor.
He hears the cry of the oppressed.
But He permits human freedom because He made us for love, not programming.
There is also suffering that does not come directly from personal sin: illness, natural disasters, accidents, weakness, ageing, death.
These too belong to a fallen and wounded creation.
We do not always know why God permits a particular suffering.
Often we do not know.
And it is better to say honestly:
“I do not know why this has happened,”
than to pretend we can explain every wound.
But we do know this:
God does not love evil.
God does not abandon the suffering.
God can bring good even out of what He does not will as evil.
3. God can bring good from evil
This does not mean evil becomes good.
Evil remains evil.
Sin remains sin.
Cruelty remains cruelty.
Death remains an enemy.
We must never say to someone who is suffering:
“This evil is good really.”
No.
But God is so powerful, so wise, and so merciful that He can bring good even out of evil.
The clearest example is the Cross.
The crucifixion of Jesus was the worst sin in human history.
The innocent Son of God was betrayed, mocked, tortured, condemned, and killed.
Humanly speaking, it looked like failure.
It looked like evil had won.
It looked like God was silent.
And yet, through that very Cross, God brought salvation to the world.
God did not make betrayal good.
He did not make cruelty good.
He did not make murder good.
But He brought redemption through what evil did.
That is the heart of Christian hope.
If God can bring the Resurrection from the Cross, then no suffering is beyond His power to redeem.
This does not mean we will always see the good immediately.
Often we will not.
Some suffering remains mysterious.
Some wounds are not healed quickly.
Some grief lasts a lifetime.
But the Cross tells us that evil never has the final word.
God can work even in darkness.
God can bring humility from humiliation.
Compassion from sorrow.
Courage from weakness.
Repentance from failure.
Holiness from suffering.
Hope from grief.
And finally, resurrection from death.
This is not a cheap answer.
It is the answer written in the wounds of Christ.
4. Jesus does not watch suffering from a distance
The Christian answer to suffering is not first a theory.
It is Jesus.
God did not remain far away from human pain.
The Son of God became man.
He was born into poverty.
He was threatened as a child.
He knew hunger, tiredness, rejection, misunderstanding, betrayal, injustice, physical agony, abandonment, and death.
Jesus wept.
Jesus was moved with compassion.
Jesus touched lepers.
Jesus healed the sick.
Jesus raised the dead.
Jesus stood with the broken.
And finally, Jesus carried the Cross.
This changes everything.
When Christians suffer, we do not suffer before a God who has no idea what pain is.
We suffer before the Crucified.
He knows.
He knows physical pain.
He knows emotional anguish.
He knows betrayal by a friend.
He knows being misunderstood.
He knows being mocked.
He knows fear in the garden.
He knows the silence of Holy Saturday.
He knows death.
So when we cry out in suffering, we cry out to a Lord who has entered suffering from within.
He may not answer every “why” in the way we want.
But He answers with Himself.
He says:
“I am with you.”
“I have gone before you.”
“Your suffering is not meaningless if it is united to Me.”
“I can bring you through death into life.”
This is why the crucifix matters.
A bare cross can remind us of victory.
But the crucifix shows us the cost of love.
It shows that God has not avoided suffering.
He has entered it to save us.
5. The Cross does not remove every suffering immediately
Sometimes people expect faith to remove suffering.
They think:
“If I pray enough, God will take this away.”
Sometimes God does heal.
Sometimes God does intervene dramatically.
Sometimes prayers are answered in obvious ways.
We should believe that.
We should ask for healing.
We should pray with confidence.
We should bring our needs to God.
But God does not always remove suffering immediately.
Saint Paul prayed that his “thorn in the flesh” would be taken away.
But the Lord answered:
“My grace is sufficient for you.”
That is not the answer Saint Paul first asked for.
But it was an answer.
Sometimes God removes the burden.
Sometimes He gives strength to carry it.
Sometimes He changes the situation.
Sometimes He changes the heart.
Sometimes He heals the body.
Sometimes He deepens faith through weakness.
This is hard.
No one should pretend otherwise.
But Christianity is not a promise that believers will avoid all suffering.
Jesus says:
“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
He does not say:
“Follow Me and you will never suffer.”
He says:
“Follow Me, and even your suffering can become a path to life.”
The Cross does not mean God has failed.
The Cross is the place where God’s love goes all the way down into suffering and begins to transform it from within.
6. Suffering can be united to Christ
This is one of the deepest Christian truths.
Suffering by itself can feel meaningless.
But suffering united to Christ can become prayer.
It can become offering.
It can become love.
It can become intercession.
This does not mean we seek suffering for its own sake.
Christianity is not a love of pain.
We should relieve suffering where we can.
We should care for the sick.
Feed the hungry.
Defend the weak.
Comfort the sorrowful.
Seek justice.
Use medicine.
Protect the vulnerable.
But when suffering cannot be avoided, it can be united to Christ.
A sick person can say:
“Lord, I offer this with You.”
A grieving person can say:
“Lord, hold my sorrow in Your wounds.”
A parent worried for a child can say:
“Lord, I place this fear into Your hands.”
A person in pain can pray:
“Jesus, I unite this suffering to Your Cross for those who need grace.”
This is not magic.
It is communion with Christ.
Christ has made even suffering capable of becoming love.
The world often says suffering is useless.
The Christian says:
No suffering united to Christ is wasted.
Hidden suffering can bear fruit.
The prayers of the sick matter.
The endurance of the elderly matters.
The tears of the grieving matter.
The sacrifices of carers matter.
The loneliness of the faithful matters.
When offered with Christ, these things can become part of the Church’s prayer.
That gives dignity to those who suffer.
They are not useless.
They are not burdens.
They are close to the Crucified Lord.
7. We must not blame every suffering on personal sin
This is very important pastorally.
Sometimes people suffer and wonder:
“Is God punishing me?”
Or others may wrongly suggest:
“You must have done something wrong.”
The Gospel warns us against that.
When Jesus meets the man born blind, His disciples ask:
“Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
Jesus rejects that way of thinking.
Not every suffering is caused by personal sin.
Of course, some suffering does come from sin.
If someone drinks heavily, drives dangerously, lies, betrays, or acts violently, suffering may follow.
Sin has consequences.
But we must not assume that every suffering person is being punished.
That is cruel and false.
The innocent suffer.
Children suffer.
The just suffer.
The saints suffer.
Jesus Himself suffered, and He was without sin.
So when someone is suffering, our first response should not be speculation.
It should be compassion.
Not:
“What did you do wrong?”
But:
“How can I love you?”
Not:
“God must be punishing you.”
But:
“Christ is close to the broken-hearted.”
God may use suffering to purify, awaken, humble, or draw someone closer.
But that does not mean we can explain every suffering as punishment.
We must be careful with our words.
A careless answer can wound a soul.
8. Why does God seem silent?
One of the hardest forms of suffering is the silence of God.
A person prays and feels nothing.
Begging for help.
No clear answer.
No immediate relief.
No sense of comfort.
This can be agonising.
Even the saints knew this.
The Psalms cry out:
“How long, O Lord?”
Jesus Himself prayed from the Cross:
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
So if a person feels abandoned, they are not automatically faithless.
They may be standing very close to the mystery of the Cross.
God’s silence is not the same as God’s absence.
A teacher may be silent during a test, but still present.
A parent may allow a child to struggle in order to grow, while remaining near.
A seed grows in hidden darkness before it breaks the surface.
These images do not remove the pain.
But they remind us that God can be at work even when we do not feel Him.
Faith is not the same as feeling comfort.
Faith is trust in God even when comfort is absent.
Sometimes the prayer of faith is very simple:
“Lord, I do not understand.”
“Lord, I am afraid.”
“Lord, help me.”
“Lord, stay with me.”
“Lord, into Your hands I commend my spirit.”
God hears those prayers.
Even when we feel nothing.
9. The Church must be close to those who suffer
A Catholic answer to suffering cannot be only words.
It must become charity.
If we say God is close to the suffering, then the Church must be close to the suffering.
The sick should not be forgotten.
The housebound should not be invisible.
The grieving should not be abandoned after the funeral.
The poor should not be treated as problems.
Those with mental illness should not be dismissed.
Those who are lonely should not be left alone.
Those who are abused or unsafe must be protected.
Those who are dying should be accompanied with prayer and the sacraments.
The Church defends the meaning of suffering, but she also works to relieve suffering.
Both are necessary.
We do not say:
“Suffering can be redemptive, so we do not need to help.”
That would be a betrayal.
Christ healed the sick.
Christ fed the hungry.
Christ comforted the sorrowful.
Christ touched the untouchable.
So must we.
A parish should be a place where suffering people are not embarrassed to come.
Where tears are not treated as failure.
Where grief is carried.
Where the sick are visited.
Where people are prayed for by name.
Where the sacraments are brought to the weak.
Where the Cross is preached not coldly, but tenderly.
This is part of defending the faith.
People may not first be convinced by an argument about suffering.
But they may see the truth of Christ when His people love those who suffer.
10. Suffering is not the end of the story
Christian hope is not vague optimism.
It is not pretending everything is fine.
It is not saying:
“Cheer up.”
Christian hope rests on the Resurrection.
Jesus truly died.
And Jesus truly rose.
That means death is not the final word.
Evil is not the final word.
Sickness is not the final word.
Grief is not the final word.
The grave is not the final word.
God will judge evil.
God will heal creation.
God will raise the dead.
God will wipe away every tear.
Heaven is not an escape from reality.
It is reality healed, fulfilled, and made glorious in God.
This matters because some sufferings are not fully healed in this life.
Some injustices are not fully corrected here.
Some griefs are not removed here.
Some questions are not answered here.
If this life were all there is, suffering would be unbearable.
But this life is not all there is.
The Resurrection tells us that what is broken can be restored.
What is buried can rise.
What is wounded can be glorified.
This does not make present pain easy.
But it gives hope.
The Christian does not say:
“I understand everything.”
The Christian says:
“Christ is risen.”
And because Christ is risen, suffering will not have the final word.
11. How to answer this simply
So if someone asks:
“Why is there suffering if God is good?”
You might say:
“God did not create us for suffering. Suffering belongs to a fallen world wounded by sin, but God has entered suffering through the Cross and can bring good even from evil.”
Or:
“Christianity does not give a cheap explanation for suffering. It gives us Christ crucified and risen, who suffers with us and opens the way to eternal life.”
Or:
“God permits evil, but He does not love evil. He gives human freedom, calls us to repentance, and can redeem even what evil damages.”
If someone says:
“Why does God not stop all suffering now?”
You can say:
“I do not know why God permits every particular suffering. But I know that He has not remained distant from suffering. He has entered it in Christ, and He promises resurrection.”
If someone says:
“Is God punishing me?”
You can say:
“Not every suffering is punishment. Jesus Himself rejected that assumption. Bring your suffering to Christ, who is close to the broken-hearted.”
If someone says:
“My prayer was not answered,”
You can say:
“Sometimes God gives what we ask. Sometimes He gives strength to carry what remains. His silence is not the same as absence.”
Simple answers are often best.
When someone is grieving, fewer words may be better.
Sometimes the best defence of the faith is not an argument, but faithful presence.
12. What this asks of us
If Christ has entered suffering, then we must face suffering differently.
We should not despair.
We should not pretend.
We should not give cruel explanations.
We should not abandon those who suffer.
We should not waste our own suffering.
We should bring suffering to Christ.
We should pray honestly.
We should ask for healing.
We should accept help.
We should offer what cannot be changed.
We should accompany others.
We should receive the sacraments.
We should remember heaven.
Each of us can ask:
Do I trust Christ when life is painful?
Do I pray honestly, or do I hide my sorrow from God?
Do I judge those who suffer?
Do I help carry the burdens of others?
Do I unite my own suffering to the Cross?
Do I believe that the Resurrection is stronger than death?
The Christian life does not remove every tear now.
But it gives every tear somewhere to go.
Into the hands of Christ.
Into the wounds of Christ.
Into the hope of the Resurrection.
Conclusion
So why is there suffering if God is good?
We do not know every reason for every suffering.
We should be honest about that.
But we do know this.
God made the world good.
Suffering belongs to a fallen and wounded creation.
God permits evil, but He does not love evil.
Human freedom is real, and sin has consequences.
God can bring good even from evil.
Jesus Christ has entered suffering through the Cross.
He is close to the broken-hearted.
He can unite our suffering to His own.
He calls His Church to comfort, protect, heal, and accompany those who suffer.
And through His Resurrection, suffering and death will not have the final word.
So we do not say:
“Pain does not matter.”
We say:
“Christ has entered pain.”
We do not say:
“I understand everything.”
We say:
“Christ is risen.”
We do not say:
“God has abandoned me.”
We say:
“Lord, stay with me in the darkness.”
To summarise, remember these three simple answers.
Why is there suffering if God is good?
Because the world is good but wounded by sin.
Because God permits evil but does not love evil.
Because Christ entered suffering through the Cross and opened the way to Resurrection.
If you remember nothing else, remember this:
Christianity does not explain suffering away. It points to Christ crucified and risen, who enters our suffering and promises that evil will not have the final word.
Each of us should ask:
Where do I need to bring my suffering to Christ?
Because He is not far from the wounded.
He is the Crucified Lord.
And He is risen.
Amen.
Q&A after Session 11
- Why does God allow suffering?
- Is suffering a punishment from God?
- Why does God sometimes seem silent?
- Why does God not stop evil immediately?
- Can suffering ever have meaning?
- What does it mean to unite suffering to Christ?
- How should Catholics help those who suffer?
- How does the Resurrection change the way we face suffering?
Closing prayer
Lord Jesus Christ,
You carried the Cross
and entered the deepest suffering of the world.
Be close to the sick, the grieving, the lonely,
the wounded, the frightened, and the dying.
Give strength to those who suffer,
compassion to those who care for them,
and hope to those who feel abandoned.
Teach us to unite our pain to Your Cross,
to trust You in darkness,
and to look with hope towards the Resurrection.
Amen.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
St. Mary's, St. John Bosco and St. Edward's 