Msgr Pope ping
Timely post. My 39 year old brother just died from incurable aggressive liver cancer that was caught 9 months ago. Chemotherapy treatments tailed and he spent his lasts 2 months in hospice care.
For much of that 9 months, I prayed for the Lord to heal my brother based upon my faith that he would heal my brother’s cancer. I wasn’t even praying for him to be cured, but just to go into remission and give him a few years to life a renewed life that he would appreciate from his miraculous extension.
The Lord saw fit not to grant the miracle I prayed for. God doesn’t serve me, and I would never temp nor test him. This failure still shakes me and leaves me wondering if I didn’t kill my brother because my faith was too weak for the Lord to grant the miracle I had prayed for.
I full realize it may just be that the Lord had other plans for my brother, my faith notwithstanding. But faith being the bedrock of the Lord’s healing miracles, I really thought my faith was sufficient that the Lord would heal my brother and give him a few extra years on the earth.
I don’t blame God for a thing. I am just left wondering if maybe my faith is too weak, and that hurts and scares me. You would think I would know if my faith was absolute or not. You would think I know. But I don’t.
From Fr. George W. Rutler
When Lazarus died, the disciples were puzzled that our Lord sat down on the Jericho road and waited for a while before starting off for Bethany. But this was part of a plan. He tells them something that sounds strange at first: that during daylight people walk freely, but at night they stumble because there is no light in them (John 11:10). He does not say that there is no light outside them, for that would be physical light. He is speaking of himself, the Light of the World. That is, he illuminates the intellect and will, in order to reveal his plan for our mortal lives. Just as height is different from stature, so does seeing become perception when guided by the light shines in the darkness (John 1:5).Such confidence in Gods plan explains the serenity of the saints. It is not despite rough times and challenges, but because they deliberately slog through them, that the saints know that Christ is in charge. Only human pride doubts that, as in the case of the Pharisees who plotted against the Lord of History even when they saw him raise Lazarus from the tomb. For them history was a static moment, and they did not trust where the Lord was taking them. But to those who follow him, he says the equivalent of the traditional helmsmans cry, Steady on. In more elegant diction he says, Be glad and rejoice forever and ever for what I am creating (Isaiah 65:18).
Thanks be to God for His awsome creation, human, animal, and the envieronment!