The End Of Suffering

by Christopher Heuertz

Farm subsidies seem fair. But do they help everyone, or only us? The sad truth is that because of the policies of the IMF, World Bank, and farming subsidies, people in parts of West Africa are actually able to buy food imported from the U.S. cheaper than they can buy the same products from local farmers. Jon Sobrino refers to this reality as the difference between people dying from hunger and being killed by hunger.

At the beginning of this summer, American authorities stated that the responsibility of the global crisis of raising food prices lay with China and India. Our leaders even suggested that the “apparent improvement” of people’s diets in China and India are to blame for the crisis. Really? Of the world’s 32,000 children who die daily because they don’t have enough to eat, nearly 80 percent of them live in south Asia. The global food crisis is their fault?

Even our entertainment industry cannot go on as if it really cares about starving kids in Asia. Last year I watched the NFL playoffs wondering how much it costs to staff a football franchise. Thanks to the Googleization of the world, I plugged the question into a search engine, did the math, and discovered that the 2007 NFL payroll (just players, not coaches or management, and not including bonuses or team expenses) was $3.2 billion. Compare that to Sierra Leone’s 2006 GDP of $1.4 billion.

All of these instances make me wonder if we really can care deeply about alleviating suffering.

Nevertheless, I’m not really sure we can’t care, especially those of us who call ourselves followers of Christ. At the heart of almost all suffering is poverty, and poverty is fundamentally an assault on the character and image of God. The presence of widespread poverty and suffering calls God’s goodness into question. Of course, this is not always obvious to Westerners because it’s easy for us to believe in the concept of a “good God.” I have nearly everything I want and have access to everything else. I can eat three (or more) meals a day. Because of my climate-controlled townhouse, I don’t have to fear dying of thirst in the summer or freezing to death in the winter. Because of indoor plumbing, I don’t have to bathe naked on the sidewalk. I am rarely forced to legitimately question God’s goodness because of my life circumstances.

So how does someone like me come to a better understanding of the nature of suffering? How can I see the reality of poverty and suffering as assaults on God’s character? And is it possible for me, as a Christian who is not poor, to offer my life as a gift of grace to those who are poor? If so, how do I do that?

THE END OF SUFFERING IS THE BEGINNING OF SUFFERING

This issue is much more complex than one could dare to tackle in a short essay. Any conversation about suffering would need to include indepth discussions regarding the nature of power, causes of poverty, a theology of the kingdom of God, and the responsibility of the church. We would also need to explore questions like: Who are the poor? What does it mean to suffer? And is all suffering bad? These are important conversations we need have. For the sake of brevity, though, I would like to offer one central affirmation that I believe is the only realistic starting point on this journey to hope. The end of the unjust suffering of the world’s oppressed poor will start with the voluntary suffering of the non-poor.

The end of suffering necessitates not merely a tokenism or theoretical affirmation of human dignity and equality, but an embodied struggle for justice. And I’m encouraged because I see signs of hope. This struggle, a new sort of civil rights movement in a failed post-civil rights world, is now simmering in the hearts of idealists who are giving themselves in relationships with people who are poor. These young idealists are cultivating the fertile soil for what is an inevitable revolution of suffering — suffering that takes the form of celebration. This includes celebrating things like simplicity, moderation, and painfully sacrificial generosity.

This beginning of suffering will require embracing a humility that puts the so-called “other” first. The beginning of suffering will also require authentic submission that amplifies the muted voices of repressed peoples whose voices have been ignored. In this revolution, we, the nonpoor, will follow the poor to God’s heart. The donor-receptor roles will ultimately be reversed and we, the non-poor, will realize that in sincere relationships with people who are poor we will all experience the power of God’s grace.

Again, this may appear to be idealistic, but a thoughtful reading of Scripture confirms such a perspective. Consider these four truths echoed throughout the biblical narrative:

God identifies with those who are marginalized, exploited, and suffering.
God secures a reciprocal means of provision for the poor through the generosity of the non-poor.
God validates and authenticates the credibility of our Christian witness and virtues in our relationships with people who are poor.
God uses those who are poor as a standard for judgment.

These are not radicalized reinterpretations of Scripture, but generative themes echoed from the earliest material in the Hebrew Bible through the Gospels and into the letters of Paul. Nor are these utopian ideals that are unattainable, but expectations of how we live out the gift of our faith.

Nowhere is this portrayed more clearly than in the teachings and example of Jesus. He reminds us of the greatest commandment — to love God with our whole being — and simultaneously invites us to love our neighbors as ourselves. Figuratively, these two choices of love can be seen as the two planks of the cross. Our love for God, the vertical post pointing upward, isn’t enough to support a crucifixion. Rather, a horizontal crossbar — the call to love humanity — needs to be affixed to the grounded post in order to complete the construction of the cross. These two pieces of wood, if viewed as the upward and outward forms of love unto God and one other, hold us in the tension of a crucifixion of love. This is what it means to take up our crosses daily and follow Christ.

Paul refers to following the example of Christ and embodying his love as working out our salvation. This sanctification process cannot be isolated from the community of other people. I’m not only referring to the immediate community in which we live, work, and worship — our adjacent neighbors, co-workers, and small group. Rather, there is a greater community in our cities, nation, and world that also feels the rippling effects of how we live. And if our freedoms are at the expense of other peoples’ abilities to choose basic things like education for their children, affordable and safe housing, even what and when to eat, then a redemptive submission of our freedoms must become a voluntary limiting to the access and availability of resources the non-poor enjoy. For those of us in the so-called Developed World, our rate of consumption is not sustainable, nor equitable, for the rest of humanity. Unknown to us in many cases, the lives we live do not reflect the love we are called to express for our sisters and brothers in need. We must change.

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