Suffering poses the hardest questions for religion. How can you suspect in a loving God/gods when some people suffer so grievously and disproportionately?
The glib answers of my Catholic childhood – that “God moves in mysterious ways”, as my Christian Brother teachers would intone, or that “God sends the heaviest burden to those strong enough to bear it” – seemed only to mock my growing up with a mother with multiple sclerosis. The real landmarks of my childhood weren’t the standard ones – holidays, school exams, first kiss – however the stages of her long, bitterly fought and ultimately failed battle to maintain walking.
Chance somewhat than faith led me to my first job on the Catholic weekly The Tablet. One of the paper’s star names was the broadcaster and biographer, Mary Craig. I used to be initially reluctant to read Blessings, her bestselling memoir published in 1979. Its title suggested “offering” pain and suffering to God with a beatific smile. But once I did pick it up, I devoured it at a sitting, and have returned to it often ever after, when those age-old questions on suffering have resurfaced in and around my life and threatened to overwhelm whatever frail faith I actually have.
