Psalm 137:7

suffering is never wasted

If I shall walk in the midst of tribulation, thou wilt quicken me: and thou hast stretched forth thy hand against the wrath of my enemies: and thy right hand hath saved me. (Psalm 137:7 DR)

Archbishop Venerable Fulton J. Sheen famously stated that “There is nothing more tragic in all the world than wasted pain.” By this he means that we will all face suffering and tribulations of all kinds throughout our pilgrimage in this vale of tears, but that suffering need not be meaningless. If it is only pain and suffering then it is wasted, because every moment of suffering is a moment of grace in which that suffering can be offered to God as an oblation pleasing unto Him, united with our Lord’s suffering on the cross:

Think also of how much of that suffering goes to waste. How many of those lonesome, suffering, abandoned, crucified souls are saying with our Lord at the moment of Consecration: “This is my body, take it?” And yet that is what we should be saying at that second. “Here is my body, take it. Here is my soul, my will, my energy, my strength, my poverty, my wealth—All that I have. It is yours. Take it! Consecrate it! Offer it!” Offer it to the Heavenly Father with yourself, in order that he, looking down on this great Sacrifice, may see only you, his beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased. Transmute the poor bread of my life into your life; thrill the wine of my wasted life into your divine Spirit; unite my broken heart with your Heart; change my cross into a crucifix. (Archbishop Venerable Fulton J. Sheen)

The paradox of the Catholic faith is that suffering is the means of redemption, for through our Lord’s suffering on the cross our redemption was hard won through the outpouring of His blood and His life. And those who are united to His mystical Body the Church also unite their sufferings to His sufferings, and those sufferings become the forge in which sanctification is wrought. In fact, as St. Paul states, there can be no unity with Christ without this suffering:

And you have forgotten the consolation, which speaketh to you, as unto children, saying: My son, neglect not the discipline of the Lord; neither be thou wearied whilst thou art rebuked by him. For whom the Lord loveth, he chastiseth; and he scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. Persevere under discipline. God dealeth with you as with his sons; for what son is there, whom the father doth not correct? But if you be without chastisement, whereof all are made partakers, then are you bastards, and not sons. (Hebrews 12:5-8 DR)

When afflictions come upon us, it is common for us to ask “why” God allows such things to happen, or where God is when we suffer. But wrapped up within the incomprehensible mystery of salvation is that God not only allows our suffering but even brings it about on some level, not for the sake of the suffering itself, but rather for the righteousness that discipline brings about. A good father inflicts discipline upon his children, but not because he desires their suffering for its own sake. On the contrary, he knows that unless he disciplines them, unless they feel the pain of correction, they will never learn to do good and to avoid evil, and they will eventually afflict themselves more wretchedly by their own lack of discipline than he ever could by his own hand. Their momentary discomfort or pain will lead to greater good, even if in the moment they cannot understand why.

Human fathers being finite and prone to human weakness are always imperfect in their discipline, but God is perfect and infinite in His charity and mercy. We can therefore always have confidence that the trials and sufferings we experience or that befall us are in reality precious opportunities of grace mercifully offered to us by God to bring about our sanctification, if only we will lay hold of that grace through faith and perseverance.

The Psalmist comes to this penultimate verse of this Psalm with a sense of realism, knowing that he will inevitably walk in the midst of tribulation. This is inevitable, not only because of the fallen nature of our world, but also because “all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution” (2 Timothy 3:12 DR). Yet it is precisely in the midst of this tribulation that the Lord will quicken me.

The Vulgate has si ambulavero in medio tribulationis, vivificabis me. The verb ambulavero is the future perfect active indicative form, which has the sense in English of I will have walked, meaning a future action that becomes the condition of the action of vivificabis, from vivificare, to make alive, to give life to, as the English cognate vivify suggests. The action of making alive or quickening is thus conditional on the Psalmist having walked in medio—in the midst—of tribulation. In other words, the Psalmist is brought to life because he walks in the midst of tribulation; the tribulation becomes the instrumental means of his vivification, just as the discipline of the Lord through suffering becomes the instrumental means of sanctification and righteousness. The nature of our exile in this world entails that there will be some discomfort and suffering by having to live in exile:

Here however we ought the better to understand, the more closely we are united to God, and say to Him, “quickly hear me.” For he had said, “The lofty He considereth from afar”: but the lofty know not tribulation. They know not, I mean, that tribulation of which it is said in another place, “I found tribulation and sorrow, and I called on the name of the Lord.” For what great thing is it, if tribulation find thee? If thou hast any power, do thou find tribulation. And who is there, thou sayest, who findeth tribulation, or who so much as seeketh it? Art thou in the midst of tribulation, and knowest it not? Is this life small tribulation to thee? If it be not tribulation, it is not wandering: if it be wandering, either thou lovest thy country but little, or else without doubt thou sufferest tribulation. For who does not feel tribulation, that he is not with that which he longs for? (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 137, 12)

If we never face suffering, it perhaps demonstrates that we have made our home too much in this world and come to love its goods and pleasures more than the homeland of heaven. The lack of sufferings should not automatically be taken as a sign of God’s favor, when they could rather be indicative of a heart that is too attached and comfortable in this world. After all, one only feels the sting of exile when one is away from one’s homeland; one cannot be an exile while inhabiting one’s own country. And just as we do not long for the things that we already possess, so if there is no dissatisfaction with the goods and pleasures of this world, it means that we have ceased to long for heavenly things:

Whence then seemeth it not to be tribulation to thee? Because thou lovest not. Love the other life, and thou shalt see that this life is tribulation, whatever prosperity it shine with, whatever delights it abound and overflow with; since not yet have we that joy most safe and free from all temptation, which God reserveth for us in the end, without doubt it is tribulation. Let us understand then what tribulation he meaneth here too, brethren. “If I walk in the midst of tribulation, Thou shall revive me.” Not as though he said, 'If perchance there shall any tribulation have befallen me, Thou shalt free me therefrom.' But how saith he? “If I walk in the midst of tribulation, Thou shall revive me;” that is, otherwise Thou wilt not revive me, unless I walk in the midst of tribulation. “If I walk in the midst of tribulation, Thou shall revive me.” Woe to them that laugh. Blessed are they that mourn. “If I walk in the midst of tribulation, Thou shall revive me.” (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 137, 12)

It is the mind that is set on heavenly things that can begin to despise the things of this world and endure the sufferings and persecutions found within. Even further, the soul that is desirous of heavenly things and seeks to be conformed to the image of his Savior our Lord Jesus Christ, begins to correctly see suffering as a moment in which to become more Christ-like, to attain unto the final end for which God has predestined the saints:

But the things that were gain to me, the same I have counted loss for Christ. Furthermore I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord; for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ: And may be found in him, not having my justice, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ Jesus, which is of God, justice in faith: That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead. (Philippians 3:7-11 DR)

Within this mindset the Psalmist now perceives the hand of the Lord stretched forth against not simply his enemies simpliciter, but against the wrath of his enemies. Their wrath against him seeks to separate him from the love of God, but this can never be, for it is precisely in the midst of their wrath—that is, in the midst of tribulation—that God will vivify his saints, will bring them to life. The machinations of the wicked against the just and of the demons who inspire them in the end redounds to the glory of God and His saints, for these testings and tribulations become the crucible in which the dross of the love of this world and the remnants of sin are burned away and purified, until only the purest gold remains:

“Thou hast stretched forth Thine hand over the wrath of mine enemies, and Thy right hand hath made me safe.” Let mine enemies rage: what can they do? They can take my money, strip, proscribe, banish me; afflict me with grief and tortures; at last, if they be allowed, even kill me: can they do aught more? But Thou, O Lord, “hast stretched forth Thine hand over the wrath of mine enemies;” over that which mine enemies can do, “Thou hast stretched forth Thine hand.” For mine enemies cannot separate me from Thee: but Thou avengest me the more, the more Thou as yet delayest; “over the wrath of mine enemies,” Thou hast stretched forth Thine hand. Let mine enemy rage as he will, he cannot separate me from God… (St. Augustine, Exposition on the Psalms, 137, 13)

St. Augustine goes on to observe that man is already cursed by the sin of Adam to sweat and toil and suffer and die. If this is the natural state of things, what more can man truly lay upon another man? The wrath of evil men against the righteous thus has no real power to hurt them, for they cannot through their wrath separate the righteous from the charity of God. In all of their wrath God’s hand is stretched forth, both in rendering justice and judgment on the Last Day, but also in turning the wrath of the evil into the the sanctification of the righteous. The tribulation they afflict becomes the means of the righteous thus being quickened or vivified.

In the end, those who persevere in faith and righteousness will find the salvation of the Lord, for Thy right hand hath made me safe. On the temporal and worldly level this will often seem to be proven wrong, as the very existence of the martyrs would seem to demonstrate. But since there is the opposition of the kingdom of this world to the kingdom of heaven, so the safety of the hand of God is not primarily concerned with safety in the temporal and worldly sense, but rather in the ultimate safety of the soul. That is, there is the indelible correlation between the discomfort of the righteous soul in this world—since it longs for heaven—and where it finds its ultimate safety, which is not in this worldly existence but in the world to come.

And since the safety comes from the right hand of God, this safety is contrasted with what the world considers safety and salvation. This has the result of separating the evil from the righteous in respect to the same objects, for the wicked will seek the things of this world and the life therein, whereas the righteous who long for heaven will despise the things of this world and even their own lives, if it keeps them from their heavenly homeland:

According to my longing, “Thy right hand hath made me safe.” There is one kind of safety on the right hand, another on the left: temporal and carnal safety on the left, everlasting safety with the Angels on the right. Therefore Christ, now that He is placed in immortality, is said to sit on the right hand of God. For God hath not in Himself right hand or left, but by the right hand of God is expressed that happiness, which, since it cannot be shown to the eyes, is thus called. On this right hand of Thine Thou hast made me safe, not after temporal safety.

For Crispina was slain: did God then desert her? He made her not safe on the left hand, but He did on the right. How great tortures did the Maccabees suffer? But the Three Children, while they walked in the midst of the fire, praised God. The safety of the former was on the right hand, that of the latter on the left too. Sometimes then God saveth not His Saints on the left hand, on the right He always doth. The wicked for the most part He saveth on the left, on the right He doth not save them. For they who persecuted Crispina were sound in body: she was slain, they live: their safety is on the left hand, hers on the right: “Thy right hand hath saved me.” (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 137, 14)

In the mystery of God’s providence those who desire righteousness should thus be prepared for suffering, and while we shouldn’t seek it for its own sake, neither should we shrink from it as if it is a signal of God’s displeasure. We can of course afflict ourselves through stupidity and suffer the natural consequences for our own sins, but penance can turn these into moments of grace in which we offer even the just consequences of our actions as an oblation to God for love of Him.

The thief on the cross acknowledged his crime and his guilt and willingly accepted his suffering as the due recompense for his sins, and in doing so united even those just sufferings to our Lord’s innocent sufferings on the cross. What was the just punishment for his wickedness became a fountain of grace in the moment of his agony, and in the midst of his tribulation he was quickened. He could have—as did the other thief—wasted his sufferings in self-pity and despair, until death became merely a release from temporal agony without any meaning or merit. He turned away from staring into a nihilistic abyss and and instead turned to face the bruised and beautiful face of our Lord in His agony, finding within that admirable face the right hand of the Lord Who would make him safe, uniting his agony to our Lord’s agony, transforming his cross into a crucifix, his oblation of love into an offertory:

“Let not my abandonment and my sorrow go to waste. Gather up the fragments, and as the drop of water is absorbed by the wine at the Offertory of the Mass, let my life be absorbed in you. Let my little cross be entwined with your great cross, so that I may purchase the joys of everlasting happiness in union with you.” (Archbishop Venerable Fulton J. Sheen)

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I created an orb in After Effects and then created a bunch of other little orbs. I used a Looping Wiggle expression on the position of the little orbs to have them randomly move in and out of the larger orb. Once I had this as I wanted, I precomped this and applied a blur and then Roughen Edges. It takes the luminance value of the blur and converts it to smoother blending between shapes, which gives the shapes the viscosity effect as they interact.

I finally added in some color correction and glow.

Enjoy.

View a higher quality version of this gif here: