Suffering as the necessary condition for love

Scott Hahn, a prominent Theologian in his book The Fourth Cup quote the word by Pope Benedict XVI some time ago. He say, "There can be no love without suffering, because love always implies renouncement of myself, letting myself go and accepting the other in his otherness; it implies a gift of myself and therefore, emerging from myself." This statement is profound, and should be contemplated as much as we can. There is a tendency of speaking about love without mention suffering and vice versa. However, that is the thing that we won't find in true Christianity. In Teilhard De Chardin's thought, the suffering energy can be converted to love energy. Suffering is a potential energy for love.  

When God created the world, bringing the fact of the possibility of man who are having free-will to rebel against God Himself. Man could possibly fell into sin. Consequently all human are like this, curve to inward on oneself, as Luther uniquely describe (Incurvatus in se). This is the condition of sinful man, who misuses His free-will. As the result, we are only can look at our own-self. Ego become the master of everything. The universe of our life. This is the gravity of sin that even bring us to a greater sin. Thus, In our sinful nature, selfishness is the greatest problem. And the more we are drown into this mode of existence, the more we crucify love. We cannot accept other in their otherness, we can only accept our own self and expect other to respect and love us without ever thinking to do the same. 

Many religious traditions cover this issue of selfishness (self-centered), on how to deal and be liberated from that self, which normally being seen as the trouble-maker. Eastern religions promote the idea of enlightenment, awakening and released from the prison of self. Selfishness, is the mother of all tragedies. Also, one author best even portray the society we are living right now as the selfish society. Dawkins book title also capture the reality very well, as even one of the smallest things of our being are selfish. The selfish genes flows naturally in our body. Empirically speaking, we know, if everything are well, it is easy for us to stay in our safe zone, preoccupied with our own self and holding our own-selves so tightly. Without suffering, we know nothing of love, its true meaning and implication. 

Interestingly, in the other work, Scot Hamn wrote, "Jesus Christ accomplished our salvation by giving Himself, in love to be crucified." Once again, we see the close relation between suffering and love as Cross, was considered as the most wretches and shameful of all punishments; rejected man and cursed by God. Christ accomplished the grand work of salvation through his unimaginable suffering. However, It does not mean that Christ necessary needed suffering in order to expresses love and come out from his self  in order to love. Christ as a perfect man need to undergo suffering to be the main example of every man to follow. To be the unquestionable reason and rhetoric of why all man need to follow the pattern of cross. The greatest love of Christ could be that greatly emphasized in finite world, as he embrace the suffering. Nonetheless, It is essentially not for Christ's own benefit but exclusively for us. 

When we walk through the valley of the shadow as Christ did, not just we are imitating Christ, it is actually helping us to love and be a loving person as well. As we know what does it mean to suffer deeply in the light of Christ's suffering through our real life experience of encountering pain, we will be more willing to express compassion, and even offer our own life and help, for those who are in suffering, especially those who are similiar to us. In our sinful nature, love that is directed only to self cannot be said as a kind love but only a kind of narcissistic act. There is no such thing as self love but self care. The key is sufering. The more people undergo hardship and difficulties, the more they will renounce the concept of the ultimate "Amor sui" (self-love). Therefore, if we are encountering lot of suffering when we relate with various persons surround or those we love, our love that flows for them is the true kind love that comes out not of gain but of giving total self, as Christ did, for it flows from the funnel of pain.