WHY SUFFERING? – PHILOSOPHICAL & CHRISTIAN REFLECTIONS Version 1.0 Dated: 1^st May 2003

“Seeing much, suffering much, and studying much are the three pillars of learning” Benjamin Disraeli

HOW ROMAN CATHOLIC VIEW SUFFERING “Suffering, in the Catholic view of things, is a mystery. By ‘mystery’, Catholic theology mean not a puzzle to be solved as Sherlock Holmes would do, but a reality that can only be grasped and comprehended in an act of love. There is no ‘answer’ to the problem of suffering in the sense that there are answers to questions like “was Alger Hiss guilty? Or “What is two plus two?” The Church has always believed and taught that there is a different kind of answer to the question “Why do we suffer?” That answer takes us directly into the heart of the Church, which is Jesus Christ.” George Weigel, 2001, “The Truth of Catholicism” The current Roman Catholic Pope, John Paul II has written and issued an apostolic letter entitled “Salvifici Doloris” [Salvific Suffering] in February 1984 in which he deal at length with the Roman Catholic view of suffering. The following is the personal history of the present Roman Catholic Pope, John Paul II, taken again from George Weigel’s book “The Truth of Catholicism”. “Pope John Paul II has an intimate familiarity with suffering. His mother died when he was nine, and his older brother when Karol Wojtyla was twelve. AS a young man he saw his professors shipped off to concentration camps. Foe several years he walked five kilometers to work through freezing winter weather, to break rocks in a quarry or carry buckets of lime in a dingy factory while the Nazis murdered many of his friends. His father died, leaving him an orphan in an occupied country. He lost his closest friend when he was fifty. Another friend suffered a massive stroke hours before Karol Wojtyla entered the conclave that elected him pope. ……. To be continued. “Come with me and let us reason together.” (Isaiah 1:18) [Isaiah is the 23^rd Book of the Old Testament of the Bible]