S15 E3 - Suffering & Love

Abiding Together

In this week's episode, we reflect on suffering and love. We all have deep and tender places in our hearts where we suffer. Sometimes we feel alone in these sorrows and because of this, turn inwards into our pain. But the reality is, we are never alone in our suffering; God is always with us. We also reflect on fear in suffering, suffering in isolation vs suffering in communion, and how to allow God’s light to shine into these sorrowful places.

Heather’s One Thing - The Liturgy of the Hours subscription from Word on Fire

Heather’s Other One Thing - Providential Co. (especially this Sacred Heart candle)

Sister Miriam’s One Thing - Magnificat (particularly a recent excerpt from Spe Salvi paragraphs 37-40)

Sister Miriam’s Other One Thing - Everyone who sent her birthday wishes and this tiny hands birthday card

Michelle’s One Thing - “Home: A Blessed Conversations Study on the Virtues of Mary” from Blessed is She and all the women in her small group

Announcement:

Friends, we are excited to announce our 2024 Advent Study will be the book Encountering Emmanuel by Heather Khym!

Journal Questions:

• What suffering am I running from?
• Take some time to identify your current fears. How can you let these fears bring you into an encounter with Love Himself?
• Do I have a friend I can invite into my suffering? How can I be present to her suffering as well?
• How has Jesus transformed injury into compassion in my life?

Discussion Questions:

• Are you suffering in communion or in isolation?
• How can you suffer more like Jesus in this season?
• What habits in your spiritual toolbox protect your heart in moments of suffering and desolation?
• How can you love well when your heart is broken?

Quote to Ponder:

“What really hurts is not so much suffering itself as the fear of suffering. If welcomed, trustingly and peacefully, suffering makes us grow. It matures and trains us, purifies us, teaches us to love unselfishly, makes us poor in heart, humble, gentle and compassionate toward our neighbor. Fear of suffering, on the other hand, hardens us in self protective defensive attitudes and often leads us to make irrational choices with disastrous consequences.” (Interior Freedom, Fr. Jacques Philippe)

Scripture for Lectio:

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8)

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Other Resources from Laura-Anne you may like:

The Wedding Mass Program Kit

Catholic Wedding Photography

Becoming Gold Marriage Podcast

Timestamps:

00:00 - Laura-Anne

01:28 - Intro

02:20 - Welcome

06:57 - Scripture Verse and Guiding Quote

09:02 - Fear in Suffering

12:13 - Suffering in Communion

19:28 - Choosing to Love

27:41 - Transformation in Freedom

29:23 - Prayer

34:20 - Advent Study Announcement

36:13 - One Things