“Happy are those who weep as they will be consoled...”

“Happy are those who weep as they will be consoled...” (extracts)

The first word of the revelation that comes to heart when hearing Jesus talk this way is written by Saint Paul, in the 8th chapter of the Epistle to Romans.

For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. Delivered from death, it awaits in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for the redemption of our bodies (Romans 8,19-23)

 Creation expresses a real feeling of “having had enough” which is felt by all creatures, not just by men. They’ve had enough of death. Death in all forms, whether that is natural, or normal as we call it, or violent and imposed. The world, humanity cannot take anymore. It has gone on for too long. Why be born if it is only to die, to appear to disappear? With these words of Jesus, it is as if we have heard a forceful “enough!” Now it no longer has to be this way. And it is true, we waited for the Messiah so that he would put an end to this fundamental evil and dry our tears, as stated by the prophet in Apocalypse: “He will wipe all tears away from their eyes.” (Apocalypse 21, 4)

Could it be that through this proclamation by Paul, that at last the announcement of a universal victory against death will appear in the creation and Jesus will justly merit the title which he gives himself, without hesitation, on the eve of Maundy Thursday when he says, “Take heart, I have overcome the world... I have beaten death.” (John 16, 33)

The Gospel is full of these tears concerning death. Just like everywhere else, this often leads to dealing with grieving. The ancestry of Jesus are simply a succession of births and deaths. There must have been many tears! How many hundreds of thousands of litres, if we had collected them in a giant lachrymatory! But why is it like that?

Chapter 2 of Saint Matthew tells us about the massacre of children in Bethlehem, which Jesus managed to escape, but not for long. We learn of John the Baptist being put to death. We attend the burial of the sun of the widow of Nain, where we are told that there Jesus was sobbing at the deepest of his heart... In Capharnaüm, he comes face to face with crying women who create a climate of despair with their moaning. In Bethany, he cannot stop himself from crying for his friend. And around him, they say: “Look how much he cared for him...” (John 11, 36) It is perhaps also because his own death is on his mind that he finds the agony in Gethsemane so suffocating... There is something there that does not fit with the way the world works.

But why is it like that? If we look back at the history people of Israel, to the first genocide carried out by the Egyptian pharaoh and his administration, we learn that daughters in Israel were often given the name of “Myriam” - Mary. It would have been the same around the time of the Gospel, where we find at least five bearing the name. We can guess that there were many among the population. As “Myriam”, according to the most trustworthy etymology, means “Ocean of bitterness, sea of tears.” We might consider that the Virgin Mary honours the meaning of her name well: “griever.” But not” complainer.” It is not as if there had been proportionately more deaths in her family than in other families! But sensitive to the drama of the world, she is often wide-eyed and careworn, like Georges Roualt’s nurse or her Christ during the passion. Could we imagine that this girl, who feels she is living with her God, would not speak to him about the tragic accident of death, as it seems to escape him everywhere and he can neither control nor escape it! Could Mary’s messianic prayer only be based on hope and the request for the coming of someone who would limit himself to improving the trajectory of politics, the economy and religion in Israel and throughout the world? Or could it be that her heart, awakened by the Spirit, was already praying to him, as Saint Paul later says “the Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.” (Romans 8, 26-27).

When, on pilgrimage to the Holy Land, we stay in Nain, the village where Jesus gives a poor widow back her son as he was being taken for burial, we have in front of us two other points of an equilateral triangle, Nazareth on the left and Tabor on the right. So it is almost impossible not to stride from one point to another, at least in spirit, and to understand how the geography of these places affected the message of hope. Nazareth, where Myriam prayed, crying for the solace of the resurrection to come to earth. Tabor, where Jesus announced before his passion that his death would overcome death for himself and for mankind. Nain, where Jesus made a kind of first application to his future victory for the benefit of a grieving woman and a child, prematurely taken.

With all these reminders and considerations we penetrate the drama of the world alongside Jesus and Mary. Why did the Son of God come to earth, in the creation? The answer that arises is: “To remove the drama of death.” But why did death enter into the world? Who is responsible for it?

We have a habit of looking for the cause of death, either in man’s sins or the devil who pushed the man to sin. Yet, we know that this way of seeing the introduction of evil and death in the world, deeming it is caused by the original sin committed by the first human couple, is a source of outraged rejection of the faith we call Christian by many of our contemporaries. We recognised Bourvil’s final dying cry: “It’s not fair, it’s not fair!” Just like Albert Camus’ confession, “The Rebel” rebelling against the double, flagrant and terrible injustice of God: on one hand, the consequences of the faults of ancient ancestors fall upon the shoulders of billions of innocents and on the other hand, his innocent Son atones for the faults of an innumerable litany of humans. All this, we say, is because God’s justice is infinite compared to human justice which is too fluid because it is created. Many atheists then fairly represented God as a pitiless ogre who has nothing in common with the human heart!

In reality, this monstrous explanation of evil in the world and the appearance of death because of the original sin committed by irresponsible leaders comes from a misinterpreted reading of the pages of Genesis. This fundamentalist interpretation is far from being erased from religious minds. But science gives us evidence, that’s been verified multiple times, that the world has an intimate history, that it started in very disorganised conditions and that it only got to where it is now little by little. Whatever the case, death was on the earth, hundreds of millions of years before men, the prospective sinners appeared there.

God never created a universe that was perfect or finished. Science tells us of the phenomena of evolution. As for the story of Genesis, it is not a history book but a mystical reflection on a life of union and the consequences of breaking both the union with God and the union the creatures have among themselves…

Even if we hadn’t killed Jesus on the cross, he would have died a great death. It is not because Mary is immaculate that she rose to heaven without dying...from illness or age!

This way of talking is shocking for those who do not dare look at the creation as a becoming launched by God. The suffering of mankind and the creation finds in God more than an echo of true participation. How can it be possible, even metaphysically, for God, who had such a close, intimate relationship with his creation that he is an integral part of it, not to feel and experience everything that happens to it?

Paul Claudel is perhaps the first great poet who opened the path of reflection in this way:

“I believe that the Creator cannot let go of his Creation. If it suffers, he also suffers...”

“Ah! I know that he will always have this thorn in his heart! I found this path to the deepest part of his Being. I am the lord's ewe, as lost as all the others and never enough to compensate.”

                                      “The Satin Shoe”,

                                               Gallimard, p.280-281

Claudel, however, had never known nor used the tricky data of natural evolution from the creation. In his perspective, we can already hear the words of the gospel: “Do not cry like this!” (Luke 7, 13), meaning that all is never lost and that man is not acting alone at the origins of evil! God suffers with him and does not abandon the match, with a view to restoration and reconstruction: “For those who cry, the time for consoling has come.” The words of Jesus, “I am with you until the conclusion of the world” (Matthew 28, 20) are already making sense. We must gain the impressions of those injured on the path, lying in the ditch, waiting for help, who we must support and who, suddenly hear the siren of the ambulance and see the face of their rescuers...

The proclamation of the third beatitude: “Happy are those who weep as they will be consoled” can be seen as a loving excuse that the creator has just made to his creation. A little as if he was saying: “I could not do it any other way. Dreaming of making you part of my condition of God with me, I had to start small. I could not do it without hurting you, as in some way it is about you adapting to the size of my being and my infinite love! But I am with you! You becoming successful, happy is my affair as much as it is yours...”

We think of the storm where Jesus’ disciples felt threatened and distressed and the master comforted them saying: “It is me, do not be afraid!” (John 6, 20) It is not about an occasional passing storm, but the emerging human condition, coming from suffering in all its forms. We must also quote the passage from chapter 8 of Romans, as a commentary to this third beatitude:

“What more can we say! If God is for us, then who will be against us? Who will separate us from the love of Christ? As it is written...neither death, nor life...neither the present nor the future...nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8, 31-39)

We must not reserve this text simply for the lives of the disciples, apostles of Christ, threatened, having witnessed how he died, but apply it to all creation and to the society of mankind who must establish themselves with and according to God... It is true that the cross, as the Gospel tells us, is the royal throne of Christ, so it is of God, of humanity and therefore creation. It is on this throne that we wait for the coming of the end and we work on it together!

We must stop looking upon the problem of evil as a discussion on the possibility of reconciling our lapses, even physical, with divine power and goodness. We must know that God is an energy of love that looks to advance towards an “evermore” and an “ever improved”, something He started and, step by step - death being a step forward - we go towards with him, progressing little by little, even and especially when it seems as if we are stuck at an absurd impasse. “So it is our faith, says Saint John, that is the victory that has overcome the world.” (1 John 5, 4)  “Over death” As Saint Paul said.  (Corinthians 15, 54-55)

The day when, alongside the Christ of Good Friday and Easter, we are able to envisage death as the opening of a large courtyard door into the garden of eternal life, there will be no more drama...

F. Florin Callerand, January 18th, 1991
extract from “A pauper calls, God responds” p.143 - 164

French to English translation by Debbie Garrick and Cécile Simon