How well I remember my feelings as a teen-ager when reading great classic novels of tragic love! The characters seemed a cut above ordinary mortals, whose humdrum lives called for less extreme sacrifices. How magnificent, I thought, to love that deeply and suffer accordingly! As a young actress, I was attracted to tragic roles, ignoring the fact that my talent lay more in the line of comedy.
Later, however, after suffering severely from lost love myself, I was reminded of Mrs. Eddy's words, "The selfish rôle of a martyr is the shift of a dishonest mind, nothing short of self-seeking; and real suffering would stop the farce."Miscellaneous Writings, p. 288. Real suffering did stop the farce, but not until I was willing to admit that no suffering, in and of itself, bestows greatness on its victim.
God doesn't reward us for remaining perpetually brokenhearted over a lost love or for playing the self-appointed role of a martyr for some personal cause. The only commitment worthy of our total devotion is our commitment to let our lives express universal Love. Only through fulfilling that commitment can we find glory and find, too, companionships that bring joy rather than despair.
Are we, then, to totally discount the literature and history that tell the lives of tragic figures? If we did, we might miss valuable lessons and insights into character. Tragic dramas often expose hidden evil and illustrate its self-destructive nature; or they may call attention to social injustices that need correction. The history of martyrs can provide inspiring examples of people who put conscience and Truth above fear of death. The harm would come only in a misinterpretation of the message of tragic suffering—a misinterpretation that would lead one to magnify and cherish a suffering sense of life, as if the endurance of pain were a special virtue. Such a misinterpretation would see the glory of Jesus' life as culminating in the agony of his crucifixion rather than in his resurrection and ascension. Jesus' life, rightly understood, emphasizes the necessity of elevating one's consciousness above the pain of suffering in order to glorify God through a diviner loyalty.
We've probably all known people who, when faced with personal tragedy, have moaned, "Why me?" in a way that sounded almost as if they were taking credit for having been singled out for a special distinction—that of suffering more than others. Often it is a subtle but false sense that causes people who are perfectly capable of rising above tragedy and of moving forward to cling to their sadness, pain, memories of injustice, and thwarted desires. Such attitudes are encouraged by the media's tendency to give prominent, sensational coverage to personal tragedies.
The recognition that God is the sole source of both honor and dominion and that He bestows these impartially and abundantly on those who do His will frees mortals from the futile search for personal adulation. One of the lures with which Satan tried to tempt Jesus was personal glory. Jesus rejected this offer by quoting the Scripture, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve."Matt. 4:10. Throughout his ensuing ministry, Jesus identified honor only with God. Even the glory that resulted from his suffering on the cross was not brought about by the suffering but by the victory over suffering. Mrs. Eddy writes of this event: "Glory be to God, and peace to the struggling hearts! Christ hath rolled away the stone from the door of human hope and faith, and through the revelation and demonstration of life in God, hath elevated them to possible at-one-ment with the spiritual idea of man and his divine Principle, Love."Science and Health, p. 45.
Looking to God as the source of recognition rather than to personally distinguishing circumstances (whether tragic or otherwise), we cease to romanticize sadness, and we see man as eternally characterized by his reflection of God.
Often the linking of glory and grief is not a conscious choice in the mind of the sufferer. In dealing with a case in which sadness seems particularly aggressive and unyielding, a Christian Science practitioner may be led to give specific attention in mental treatment for that patient to a vehement denial of the general world belief that there is great merit in suffering per se. In many cases this denial, accompanied by an affirmation of God as the source of all glory, may be exactly what is needed to free the patient from the grip of sorrow and bring a fresh receptivity and willingness to yield to the healing Comforter. Then we find satisfaction through the revelation of our at-one-ment with God, our unity with goodness and with universal Love, which knows no separation or loss, no injustice or personal possessiveness, no stubborn, misplaced loyalty or willful passion. We begin to feel the incomparable reward of knowing we are God's own.
When the Apostle Paul rejoiced in tribulation, it wasn't because suffering gave him pleasure but because his dominion over suffering united him with the glory of God—the glory that Christ Jesus had demonstrated so fully. And so today, clinging persistently to a tragic sense of suffering does not give us anything to boast about. Only our dominion over that sadness (through the recognition of the ever-present Christ-power) gives us abundant reason for rejoicing. As Paul put it when writing to the Romans, "I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us."Rom. 8:18. But when? one might ask. Mrs. Eddy writes, "Now is the time for so-called material pains and material pleasures to pass away, for both are unreal, because impossible in Science."Science and Health, p. 39.
What freedom comes from understanding through Christian Science that there is no reality in suffering but that eternal glory is available to each of us now through divine reflection! When the subtle belief is gone that says there is gain in identification with tragic circumstances, suffering loses its appeal to mortal thought and becomes easier to outgrow.
The joy that comes from waking up each day and knowing oneself to be the blessed child of God—not a finite personality with a scarred mortal past or doomed to a joyless future, but held in the eternal now of Love's ever-presence —is infinitely more satisfying than the dubious distinction of believing oneself a talented sufferer. This joy is more than merely looking on the bright side of things. The divine influence breaks a morbid attachment to tragic experiences, heals all belief in their reality, and exchanges helplessness for dominion.
Anyone who has felt the temptation of self-pity and has sought self-glorification through personal martyrdom or sorrow can rejoice now in a more Christly view and can experience the transformation that comes with obedience to this scriptural admonition: "He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."I Cor. 1:31. With deep joy, we can join in the final line of Jesus' great prayer as recorded in Matthew, "For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever."Matt. 6:13.
