The Glory of Suffering

September 30th Readings Reflection: Memorial of Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church

In today’s Gospel, Jesus told His disciples that He would “be handed over to men,” prophesying His Passion and death. His disciples, however, did not understand what Our Lord meant, “and they were afraid to ask [H]im about this saying.”

The Church celebrates the feast of St. Jerome today. A Doctor of the Church, St. Jerome lived in the 4th century and is most famous for having translated the Bible into Latin. In one of his many writings, St. Jerome gave us the following quote on the true meaning of martyrdom, which I think is especially fitting in light of today’s Gospel reading: “Martyrdom does not consist only in dying for one’s faith. Martyrdom also consists in serving God with love and purity of heart every day of one’s life.”

The disciples in today’s Gospel showed a fear of suffering to which we all can relate. As human beings, we are afraid of suffering and instinctively try to avoid it whenever possible. However, our experience shows that suffering is inevitable in this life due to Original Sin. As long as sin exists in the world, suffering will exist, for sin causes suffering through its perversion of nature. When we think of martyrdom, we appropriately think of those who gave their lives for the Faith. Such a martrydom, called a red martyrdom, involves the physical shedding of the martyr’s blood and a level of suffering that is difficult to imagine.

The Catholic Church also recognizes another form of martyrdom, called white martyrdom. In the words of St. Jerome, white martyrdom refers to “those…who aspired to the condition of martyrdom through strict asceticism.” Most of us will never have the opportunity to give our lives for the Faith, but we all have countless opportunities throughout our lives to suffer for Christ. When we experience any sort of trial, it is an opportunity to unite ourselves with Jesus in His Passion. We have the opportunity to offer our sufferings to Him in reparation for our sins and for the sins of the world.

The Church encourages us to deliberately make little sacrifices each day that we can offer to God. Fridays are days of penance in commemoration of Good Friday, and Catholics traditionally abstain from eating meat on all Fridays of the year (excluding solemn feasts) as a voluntary penance. By foregoing something that is in itself good—such as the consumption of meat on Friday—we earn spiritual merit for ourselves and others. Penance and sacrifice also give us tangible reminders that while food is necessary for our health and continued existence on earth, we would not exist in the first place if it were not for God’s ceaselessly loving us and willing us to exist at each and every moment.

When we bear our daily crosses with “love and purity of heart,” as St. Jerome said, we offer ourselves to God as living martyrs. Just as those martyrs who gave their lives for the Faith received crowns of glory in Heaven, so too we will receive our own crowns one day if we remain steadfast in our love for God, patiently bearing our crosses and uniting our sufferings to His.

St. Jerome, ora pro nobis!