Our Lord did tell us that a condition required if we are to be His disciples is that we take up our cross after denying ourselves and follow Him. We certainly do not need to go around looking for difficulties in life or to ask for trouble, and although some positive self-denial is needed, some going against our inclinations voluntarily in matters that are not forced on us, we do not have to choose crosses as a rule. They come to us under God’s Providence, and what we need is a deliberate acceptance of them when there is no reasonable or virtuous way of getting rid of them. It is true that some people are moved by the Holy Spirit to seek crosses and to choose very austere forms of life. Most of us are not called to do that, but to make the best possible use of what God sends.
. . . Toothache is the same whether you grumble about it or whether you accept it while waiting for the dentist; it makes no difference to the pain you feel. But saying “Yes” to what God sends or allows, especially when it is a cross, unites us with Christ, and that union with Christ is the only way to have a really deep prayer-life and move towards becoming a contemplative in the world. “Take up your cross,” Jesus said—don’t make a fuss about it—“and follow me.”
It is, I think, surprising how many of us quite seriously and reverently say the Our Father, even just before Communion, and we say “Thy will be done” and yet are at the same time discontent with something God has sent us to do or suffer or do without. It is also surprising how many of us say the Rosary regularly (thank God) and ask God that “meditating on these mysteries of the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary we may imitate what they contain and obtain what they promise.” And what do they contain? Joyful mysteries, yes . . . but also an Agony in the Garden, Scourging at the Pillar, Crowning with Thorns, the Way of the Cross, and Crucifixion. . .
One of the reasons why we find it difficult to accept our crosses well is the fact that we have so little appreciation of Jesus’ love for each of us as an individual, as the unique person we are. Because of our many failings and faults we half think He is not quite happy with us, and we feel rather uneasy with Him . . . Despite the greatest sacrifice He could make for each of us, we still lack confidence in Him. . .
If we make the sad mistake of thinking that Jesus does not really love us as the individual person we are, we are not, as we might think, showing humility or awareness of our faults; we are doubting His unconditional love. . .
I suppose we shall never really experience the deepest peace of God and the peace of self-acceptance in God if we have not got the right attitude to our own sufferings and discomforts. They are, did we but know it, graces from the love of God, and if willingly accepted and endured, they open up depths within us closer and closer to that center where God actually dwells and creates and sanctifies us by His active presence and contact with us.
