remembering nanay trining: 5th Sunday of Easter C

Today, liturgical law prohibits us from using the funeral mass.  Liturgical law stipulates that we have to stick it out with Easter even if we have to recite the Gloria in the presence of the dead and in the midst of our grief.  The Sundays of Easter cannot be replaced even by something so extraordinary, so singular like this funeral, not because Easter is more important than death, not because Easter is prior to a requiem, but because Easter is so encompassing everything derives its meaning from Easter, everything is explained by Easter, even our view of things and events is transformed by Easter, and that includes death, most especially death.  We are nothing without Easter.  This death would be nothing without Easter.  In fact our lives would be nothing without Easter.   So no, we could not miss even just a Sunday of Easter, otherwise what is the point of living and what is the meaning of dying.

Today as we finally bring Nanay Trining to her longed for rest, I would like to reflect on suffering, specifically on prolonged and lingering suffering and the hope and love it engenders in each one of us.

Nanay Trining has suffered for a number of years, for so long, with old age and a variety of diseases that has left her bedridden and dependent on others.  In fact kadamo na sang iya mga pariente ang nag-overtake sa iya bisan pa nga una sia nagmasakit sang sa ila.  And although the people around her would always show a brave face to never give up on her no matter how futile and hopeless, the toll and the burden must have been exacting especially for Munding and Daday.  I remember my father, Nanay Trining’s brother, telling us one time that he wanted a quick exit just like his good friend Dr. Etik Flores.  My father was afraid to suffer.  He was afraid of becoming a burden to his family.  He was afraid of the uselessness he has to go through day in and day out.  Sin-o lang abi sa aton ang wala nahadlok sina.  And though his prayer and wish were not granted, his was not as long as Nanay Trining.

There is a difference between suffering a temporary toothache or those painful gallstones that can be remedied in time, or even an on and off pain brought about by arthritis or migraine.  There is a difference between these and an illness that is both prolonged and lingering and which will surely and only end in death.  Sa pagkalawig nga masakit, sa pagkalawig nga pag-antus kag pagbatas, sa ulihi mapatay ka man lang.  Ngaa wala na natapos sa primero pa lang?  Ngaa ginpalawig pa?

In suffering it is important to find meaning, it is important to find an explanation although there will never be sufficient answers to everything we undergo.  But searching for answers to our questions is important.  We find strength in that, when we are able to make sense of what is happening, when we are able to find a purpose for something.  And so, I would like to propose two things for our reflection this Sunday taken from our second reading and from gospel.

Our second reading speaks of the time when the Lord will bring about a new heavens and a new earth.   The old earth, the old heavens will pass away.  Something new is coming.  And curiously our second reading says that when the old passes away the seas, ang kadagatan will be no more.  Wala na dagat.  It is not saying that Boracay, something most of us crave for this summer, will be gone for good.  Of course not.  This passage is symbolic.  When the earth was not yet created the author of Genesis describes it as a sea, so vast and so dark.  It was a way of describing a world without the creative touch of God – it was world so confusing, it was a world in chaos.  When the disciples of Jesus where at sea, on a boat, their situation would always be described as confusing, chaotic, insecure, tossed about by the waves, and they would always feel wanting.  In that boat on the sea, Jesus was even described as asleep – an  imagery which describes a real situation which we often paraphrase as natutulog ang Dios – Jesus is asleep in the midst of the chaos of our lives.  But have hope Jesus is in control.  Not only did he calm the waves and stop the strong wind.  Jesus can walk over the waters.  He can walk over it.  He can walk above the waves with the sea under him – a fact that gives us an imagery of the time when the sea will be no more.

Chaos, suffering, confusion makes us look forward.  It helps us to see beyond our present predicament.  It arouses in us longing, longing that the wrong will be righted, longing that what is lacking will be provided.  It helps us recover hope.  It tells us that our world will never be perfect despite its advances.  Suffering tells us that we alone, despite our knowledge , despite our abilities, can never bring this world, can never  bring this life, can never bring our life to perfection.  We have to set our eyes on Jesus who alone walks over the water.  This is what Nanay Trining aroused in us.  Her suffering aroused in us hope.  She made us look forward.  She made us look beyond.  She made us long for the future, for the day that will come when the new heavens and the new earth will be created and the sea will be no more. 

Suffering is not useless.  It is not merely what made her into, but what made us into who saw her suffer.  Her suffering made us hope.  Indeed she was true to her original name Esperancilla – even just a little she has aroused in us esperanza – to long, to hope.

The second point comes from our gospel today.  If you notice Jesus gave the command, the greatest commandment to his disciples, to love one another when Judas was no longer around, when Judas left.  Jesus gave the commandment to love when the betrayer was no longer there for he was up and about in his act of betrayal.  The commandment was given when it was difficult to love someone.  It was not just some general command.  It was not some general principle that can be made useful every now and then.  No, it was given in a particular situation of anger, of  hatred, it was given in a particular situation of rage and in the confusion that it engendered – we want to know who, who is it who will betray you?  It was in this situation that the command to love was given.

Suffering is important for it situates our loving.  Loving one another is not some principle floating in the air.  It is hard fact.  Thus, it is in suffering too that the command to love is given. 

Indeed the purpose of suffering is not merely what it does to those who suffer but also to what it does to the people around her.  Suffering challenges us to love patiently, it arouses in us  compassion, it arouses in us pity, it arouses in us commitment in our loving. Suffering evokes in us the kindness that will keep us human. 

Today in this 5^th Sunday of Easter we thank the Lord for his love that transformed our way of looking at suffering.  We thank him for the life that she has given Nanay Trining and most especially for the life that God gave us through Nanay Trining’s suffering.  May the Lord grant her a blessed resurrection like his, as he allowed her to participate in suffering and death like his.  Amen.