Carrying Our Crosses

November 8th Readings Reflection: Wednesday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells us, “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after [M]e cannot be [M]y disciple.” When we think of crosses, our minds immediately think of suffering. Christ died on the Cross to redeem mankind from sin, and to accept one’s cross is to accept all the sufferings that God sends us in this life. However, in the midst of our daily toils and trials, it can be easy to forget why we are suffering. Yes, suffering is inevitable, but why is it really necessary?

The first chapter of the Epistle of St. James begins by answering this question: “My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations; knowing that the trying of your faith worketh patience. And patience hath a perfect work; that you may be perfect and entire, failing in nothing” (Jas 1:2-4 DRB). In the Douay-Reims translation of the Bible, Bishop Challoner’s note explains that the word “temptation” in this passage is often “taken for trials by afflictions or persecutions.” In other words, this passage tells us that suffering is the means by which we cultivate the virtue of patience, which is necessary in order to attain Christian perfection.

In the next chapter of the Epistle of St. James, we read, “For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also faith without works is dead” (Jas 2:26). This passage ties together what the disciple wrote in the previous chapter about suffering leading to the cultivation of virtue. Unless we carry our crosses, bearing the sufferings that God sends us in patience and virtue, our faith is “dead.”

Last week we celebrated the feast of All Souls, which the Catholic Church observes by praying and offering Masses for the Holy Souls in Purgatory. Traditionally, the entire month of November is dedicated to the Holy Souls, and the Church calls us to continue to pray and sacrifice for the Holy Souls in Purgatory throughout the entire month. While suffering is important and necessary for our own souls, as we read in the Epistle of St. James, we can also offer the merits of our sufferings for the Holy Souls in Purgatory. The souls in Purgatory are no longer able to pray for themselves, so they rely on the prayers of the Church Triumphant (the saints in Heaven) and the Church Militant (those of us on earth) to hasten their purification and arrival into Heaven. May God give us the grace to bear our crosses patiently and thereby grow in holiness and virtue, and may we always remember to offer our sufferings for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, in order that they may soon enter the eternal presence of God.