Waiting in hope

I never thought my 16-year-old daughter and her classmates would know more about eternal truths than me.  (How is that for humbling?!)  But as Scripture says, “Out of the mouths of babes…”

I don’t know if you had the chance to see the video “Project Hope” or read the story about it on the Regnum Christi website.  It is a video that my daughter and her fellow students from Everest Collegiate High School in Clarkston, Michigan, put together at the end of their school year in June, 2011.  Click here to watch.  Unless you have a very hard heart, it will likely bring a tear to your eye.  It is a beautiful reflection on the “connectedness” of the Body of Christ.

The part that affected me most was the quote from a young teacher at Everest named Matthew Mileski.  When asked the question “Why do people suffer?” he said, “The reason that there is suffering is because we are responsible for everyone. We pick up the slack that other people don’t have.  And because other people leave that slack, it’s our job to pick up the crosses that they leave behind.  We have to become like little Christs ourselves, where instead of carrying our own cross, we have to embrace our cross, but also others’ crosses as a way to make up for it.  That doesn’t bring any comfort to someone who sees their child who has cancer, but it explains why bad things happen to good people.”

I have been struggling a long time to understand why my family is undergoing the economic challenges we have been since my husband’s job loss three years ago.  He now works all the time at three smaller jobs and makes much less than he did before, and the creditors keep calling.  It has put quite a strain on our family life and marriage, to say the least.

I have also been struggling to understand the sufferings of the many people I know who are sick with cancer… of the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi currently… and on a larger scale, our Church as a whole.

I have been asking God to help us, thinking that because we are “good” Catholics who make Him the center of our lives, He will miraculously change our situation for the better.  But His answer has been similar to what He told St. Paul:  “My grace is sufficient for you.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

I recently spent a weekend retreat at the Queen of the Family Retreat Center in Oxford, Michigan, hoping to get some consolation.  The kind of comfort I wanted did not come.  My thoughts just kept returning to the words from the young teacher from Everest, and my daughter’s class video. At the end it says: “God is up to something…”

Right now, trust and God’s grace will have to be my consolation until He reveals what he is “up to” for all of us who are waiting….