| I read of a book by an Orthodox priest who spent six months counseling a depressed woman with inoperable cancer. A day or two before she died, her body wasted and emaciated, she told the priest that she thanked God for her cancer, because it took her out of her everyday lostness, and forced her to be reconciled to some truths she had long run away from. The point here is not to call cancer good, but rather to say that suffering, from a Christian perspective, always offers a chance that its pain and darkness might be redeemed by our reaction to it – by how we deal with it. Contrary to the world’s viewpoint, the Orthodox Christian understanding of sickness and suffering holds out the very real promise that they are redemptive, that through them we might come to a new understanding of ourselves, our life, and our priorities, and that by it we may come closer to God Himself. Though sickness is neverdesirable, it can free us to realize that God is the center of our life and that He alone brings healing and hope. Saint Isaac the Syrian reminds us: “He who is ill and knows his illness owes it to himself to ask for healing.” Sickness and suffering are a prism through which clarity about our life can emerge – particularly the life and health of our soul. Sickness and suffering can bring us new insights about how we live, about who is the center of our life, and about what we need to do to find the path to Paradise once again. Unlike the inadequate western medieval notions that spoke of the “directive will” of God (God sends illness) and the “permissive will” of God (God allows illness), the Orthodox understanding of suffering and illness emphasizes one central idea, best expressed in the book The Theology of Illness by the Orthodox theologian, Professor Jean-Claude Larchet: “God cannot be considered to be the author of illness, suffering and death. Man in the original state of his nature was immortal, but the incorruptibility and immortality of the first man were due solely to divine grace—which man’s ego squandered in the ancestral sin The original state of man was what we call Paradise. The loss of this blessed state through sin, meant sickness, suffering and the fracturing of all Creation was introduced into the human experience by the human himself.” Sickness is one sign of that fundamental cosmic disruption. Prof. Larchet, following the Church Fathers, states that “the source of illness, infirmities, sufferings, corruption, and death, together with all other evils that presently afflict human nature, lies in the personal will of man, in the bad use to which he has put his free will, that is, in the sin which he committed in Paradise.” The world was created good, but it was man’s responsibility to preserve it as such. We are all co-responsible with Adam; we have, over centuries and centuries, developed and multiplied the consequences of his fall. There is a solidarity in evil between Adam and his descendants. This leaves us with a collective responsibility in the face of misfortune that strikes our neighbor and indeed, ourselves. Illness is merely one expression of that spiritual paralysis.. This means that the God of the New Testament, unlike the God of the Old Testament, is not the Grand Punisher, sending sickness, suffering, plagues and pain to teach humankind a lesson. We understand that these were metaphorical means of teaching. That is an understanding of God that is inimical to the Gospel’s meaning and message and in clear contradiction to the preaching of Jesus Himself. Human sickness and suffering are products of the randomness of nature, of biological patterns, and the slow but certain deterioration of our natural world as well as human cultural behaviors. The Orthodox spiritual writer, Fr. John Breck, echoes these sentiments when he writes: “The illnesses of the body, far from being directly engendered by illnesses of the soul, are to the contrary, provoked by the health of the soul.” In other words, our physical and mental health is, in part, linked to the spiritual health of our souls. What does all of this mean for our present struggle to deal with the Covid-19 virus? Evangelical Christian denominations and others see it as God teaching us a lesson, much as they decried HIV/AIDS, some 35 years ago, as God’s judgment on a particular group of people and, by extension, on our society itself. Orthodox theology roundly rejects such a construct. St. John Chrysostom teaches: “If the soul is in good health, bodily illness can in no way harm a man. Illness, then, is only evil in appearance. It can even constitute a blessing for man in the sense that, if one uses it appropriately, one can draw from it considerable spiritual benefit, thereby making of what was originally a sin of mortality into an instrument of salvation.” This is what is known as “transformative suffering.” Prof. Larchet zeros in on this important aspect of suffering and illness: “The Fathers of the Church stress the point that “it is not in vain, nor without reason, that we are subject to illnesses.” This is why they encourage us to be vigilant when illness strikes, and not to trouble ourselves first of all with their natural causes. Rather, our first concern should be to discern their meaning within the framework of our relationship to God, and to throw light on the positive function they can have in furthering our salvation… Understood and experienced in this perspective, illness does not crush a person under the weight of their “mortal body” (Rom. 7:24), but to the contrary turns the person towards God. It reunites the person to God, drawing him towards God as the true source and end of his existence. It offers wisdom to his intelligence – that is, true knowledge of the world, of himself, and of God – and to his will it offers conformity to the will of his Creator. In short, illness and suffering reveal our truest self. Look what is occurring in our society as a result of the current pandemic. Families are drawing together in a closer way, people are talking to each other in genuine and meaningful ways. Believers are learning, perhaps for the first time, to interiorize worship because they are unable to worship in Church together. Countless first-responders and medical personnel and others are working 24/7 to reach out to help. There is a deeper consciousness of the needs of others. Parents are increasingly engaged in their children’s education, people are drawn to genuine prayer and reflection about their life, its quality and their priorities for it. In these realities and others, we see the transformation of anxiety, worry, fear, and uncertainty into the virtues – into a more reflective and attentive way of living our lives. Far from being meaningless, the present massive sickness and suffering have focused our attention on life’s meaning, our personal priorities, and how life might be different once the pandemic has passed. These are profoundly important insights that go directly to the heart of the Gospel where, as we see particularly in the Gospel of St. Luke, the point of Christ’s ministry, of his death and Resurrection was the healing and wholeness of the human person. “The well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick do.” (Luke 5:31) Our holy Mother, St. Synklectica, a desert Mother of the Church, even viewed the endurance of sickness and suffering as part of the ascetic way: “Fasting and sleeping on the ground are prescribed for us because of the passions. But if illness weakens these passions, there is no longer any justification for these practices.” This is the hidden gift of our present struggle. It is the flip side of darkness, anxiety and fear. It provides a cause for hope because it summons every one of us to continue living deeply and reflectively, to continue living connected to others in meaningful ways. St. Gregory Nazianzus urges us: “Do not admire every form of health, and do not condemn every form of illness.” His point is that the value of health and sickness are relative to how we make spiritual use of them. Take heart, dear brothers and sisters! Let us keep vigil over our souls, tend them every day, and walk confidently towards the Kingdom where every sorrow, sighing, and lamentation are conquered, much like Jesus vanquished sin and death on Holy Pascha. Christ is Risen! Truly, He is Risen! Faithfully in the Lord, |
