Catholic teaching on redemptive suffering can sometimes get a bad reputation. Often, people will throw around the phrase “offer it up” without explaining what it means.
Hearing the phrase “offer it up” or something similar without truly understanding it or at the wrong time can be very difficult for people actively going through immense suffering, such as traumatic experiences. They may not be ready to offer up their suffering because they may not feel safe and secure. Telling someone who doesn’t feel safe to offer up their suffering can make it seem like they are not understood, seen, or heard.
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This article will explore Catholic teaching on the redemptive power of suffering, drawing on Jeff Cavins’ book When You Suffer: Biblical Keys for Hope and Understanding. Then, we’ll walk through the stages of trauma recovery and how trauma-informed ministers can integrate this teaching within these stages.
Catholic Teaching on Redemptive Suffering
As Catholics, we believe that all people experience some suffering. When sin entered the world, it caused disorder, chaos, death, and universal suffering.
When Jesus suffered and died on the cross, He restored us to life and regained for us what Adam and Eve lost. And the beautiful thing is that when we suffer now, we can restore life for others.
But how? In his book When You Suffer, Jeff Cavins writes that, as members of the Church, we are members of the Body of Christ, united to Christ, our Head. So, as a Church, we are united to Christ in all things, including suffering. This unity with Christ in suffering means that our suffering can take on meaning, just as Christ’s did.
And what is this meaning? The Body and Head have one mission: redemption of the world. Christ accomplished that through suffering, and He calls us to do the same.
How Do We Offer Up Our Suffering?
Jeff Cavins writes that, to unite our suffering to Jesus’ work of redemption, we need to make an act of the will to give it to Jesus. A simple prayer, such as “Jesus, I give this suffering to You,” can be effective. Additionally, when making that act of the will, we can choose to offer our suffering for a specific intention.
Jeff Cavins also makes some suggestions for prayer during times of suffering and for offering up suffering, including:
- Ask Mary for help and guidance. She was at the foot of the cross of Jesus, and she can be with you during your crosses, helping you to unite them to her Son’s cross.
- Ask for the Holy Spirit’s help. The Holy Spirit’s goal is to conform us to Christ, so He can help us to do so during times of suffering.
- Sit with Jesus in adoration, asking for grace and strength.
- During the preparation of the gifts at Mass, when the priest prepares the Eucharistic sacrifice on the altar, make it a point to spiritually place your suffering there, offering it to God.
- Ask for the intercession of the saints.
The Steps of Trauma Recovery
Judith Herman is a famous trauma researcher. Through her work, she identified three steps of trauma recovery.
Establishing Safety
Herman emphasizes that no recovery and no processing of trauma can take place until this occurs. This process can last weeks, months, or even years, depending on the severity of the trauma experienced.
This stage involves helping people regulate emotions in healthy ways, feel safe in their bodies, take care of their basic needs, establish a secure environment and financial security, and manage mental health symptoms and other adverse effects of trauma.
Remembrance and Mourning
Now that safety is established, a person can begin telling their story. This retelling transforms our memories, allowing us to integrate them into our life story. This retelling helps people to make sense of what happened and grieve what may have been lost.
Eventually, through many retellings, people reach a point where they feel hopeful and energetic about life again.
Reconnection With Ordinary Life
In the final stage of recovery, a person begins rebuilding their life and resumes pursuing their goals. These goals may be new and, for some, may involve a survivor’s mission to help others who have been affected by similar forms of trauma.
How Does Catholic Teaching on Redemptive Suffering Fit Into Trauma Recovery?
For Individuals
Many times, a good therapist or mentor who is specifically trained to walk with people who have faced trauma will be the one to facilitate these steps of trauma recovery. If you have faced trauma and would like some guidance in trauma recovery, I recommend checking out this page to locate a good Catholic therapist or mentor. They will be able to guide you in fitting this teaching on redemptive suffering into your recovery.
For Ministry
If you are working or volunteering in ministry, you may not actively guide someone through these steps in spiritual direction, pastoral counseling, or one-on-one interactions. Still, there are ways you can support these steps and gradually introduce Catholic teaching.
Catholic teaching on redemptive suffering is so beautiful, and we ought to share it with others. However, the time for that is not in the first step of trauma recovery. Judith Herman writes that in this stage, it is challenging to process trauma or find meaning in it, and that includes giving it a redemptive meaning. At this stage, those in ministry can assist individuals in finding a suitable therapist or mentor and help address their basic needs.
Then, as people progress to the remembrance and mourning stage, we can gradually introduce them to these concepts. As we process trauma and grieve what losses it may have caused, it can be comforting and grace-giving to do the practices mentioned above, such as laying our sufferings on the altar.
Finally, in the final step of recovery, we can emphasize this teaching. As people rebuild their lives and embrace new missions, we can help them reflect on the good God could make of this suffering and on how they can offer it up for others.
Conclusion
Catholic teaching on redemptive suffering is beautiful, and introducing it to trauma survivors can help them in recovery by providing comfort and mission.
However, this teaching needs to be introduced at the proper time to be properly processed and understood, and to ensure it does not seem like a brush-off of their suffering.
To learn more about these teachings, I recommend picking up a copy of Jeff Cavins’s book When You Suffer. It is a helpful, easy-to-read guide to Catholic teaching on redemptive suffering and on how to live it out amid both significant and minor sufferings.