The Formation of Society - Part 3

This week we continue our  detailed look at the mysteries of the rosary and how they can help us to understand the wealth of grace God gives us to face some of our greatest weaknesses. Today's topic is the repugnance of suffering and the Sorrowful Mysteries as found in Pope Leo XIII's 1893  encyclical called

 

Commending Devotion to the Rosary

 

Second Influence: Repugnance to Suffering-The Sorrowful Mysteries

 

What the Problem Looks Like:

• eagerness to escape whatever is hard or painful to endure
• dreams of a chimeric civilization in which all that is unpleasant shall be removed
• desire of living a life of [only] pleasure
• belief that all that is pleasant shall be supplied

Negative Consequences:

• freedom of mind robbed, minds of men are weakened
• demoralization
• sink under the hardships of the battle of life

Remedy: The Sorrowful Mysteries

• train one's mind to dwell upon the sorrowful mysteries of Our Lord's life, and to drink in their meaning by sweet and silent meditation
• contemplate, also, the grief of the most Holy Mother, whose soul was not merely wounded but "pierced" by the sword of sorrow, so that she might be named and become in truth "the Mother of Sorrows"

Christ's Example:

• see how Christ was subjected to the judgment of the unrighteous, laden with insults, covered with shame, assailed with false accusations, torn with scourges, crowned with thorns, nailed to the cross, accounted unworthy to live, and condemned by the voice of the multitude as deserving of death
• realize that the sufferings which were hardest to bear were those which He embraced with the greatest measure of generosity and good will
• witnessing these examples of fortitude, not with sight but by faith, who is there who will not feel his heart grow warm with the desire of imitating them?

Our Hope in Following the Way of Christ:

• freedom of mind is reward of those who do what is right, undismayed by the perils or troubles to be met with in doing so
• there will be no evil which the envy of man or the rage of devils can invent, nor calamity which can fall upon the individual or the community, over which we shall not triumph by the patience of suffering
• it belongs to the Christian to do and to endure great things, for he who deserves to be called a Christian must not shrink from following in the footsteps of Christ
• it is the patience which is obtained by the help of His grace; which shirks not a trial because it is painful, but which accepts it and esteems it as a gain, however hard it may be to undergo
• Christians are able to re-echo, not with [our lips], but with [our] life, the words of St. Thomas: "Let us also go, that we may die with him" (John xi., 16)

Let us continue to implore heaven for the grace to understand the role of suffering in our life and may we turn to the Blessed Mother for intercession in life's most difficult moments. Next week, we shall conclude this four-part series on Pope Leo XIII's encyclical on the rosary, taking a careful look at the Glorious Mysteries.