Saturday July 20, 2024

Why, O LORD, do you stand aloof? Why hide in times of distress? (Psalm 10:1)

Good News Reflection for:

Saturday of the 15th Week in Ordinary Time
July 20, 2024

Today’s Readings:

Micah 2:1-5
Psalm 10:1-4, 7-8, 14
Matthew 12:14-21
bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/072024.cfm
USCCB Podcast of the Readings:
bible.usccb.org/podcasts/audio/daily-mass-reading-podcast-july-20-2024

Where is God When Disaster Hits?

When something terrible happens, it’s normal to wonder: “Where is God? I trusted him. Why didn’t he prevent this?”

Let me share my story as an example. As you may know, in February (2024) my beloved husband and co-founder of GNM, Ralph, unexpectedly passed away. He was only 68. My greatest prayer request had failed.

Ever since I fell in love with Ralph in our senior year of high school, I prayed that he would not die young. I wanted  us to grow old together — very old. When the nurse called to inform me that he had suddenly collapsed and became unresponsive, I cried out to God, “Don’t take my Ralph away from me! Remember my prayer request!”

Faith is tested in crises. Spiritual growth doesn’t usually occur in easy, comfortable times. We become stronger in faith when we have to force ourselves to trust God.

Beginning in November of 2021, Ralph and I had to deal with one crisis after another since, all of them overlapping in one long stretch of suffering. My mother collapsed and was hospitalized while Ralph and I were trying to take a long overdue vacation. As her primary caregiver, I spent a lot of time advocating for her by her bedside. I was exhausted by the time she came home, but I couldn’t find time to rest. I tried to keep up with my own healthcare while taking Mom to doctors and finding her a safer place to live.

Meanwhile, we began preparing for Ralph to have open heart surgery for a leaky valve. In early April, my mom went into the hospital again. A couple of weeks later, I took Ralph to his pre-op appointment and the blood work revealed that his hemoglobin had dropped to 4 — he was immediately admitted as an emergency.

He ended up with a different surgery. While recovering at home, he returned to the hospital with an infection that was probably caused by the surgery. Tests revealed that he no longer needed open heart surgery because his valve was now only mildly leaking — at last some good news! A miracle!

That 6-day stay in the hospital exposed him to covid. Three days later he tested positive. Then he gave it to me. Our symptoms were mild; fatigue was my biggest problem. Caregiving is exhausting, and it made us more vulnerable to medical problems.

When my energy began to return in July, I scheduled back surgery for myself. Spinal stenosis had been causing me a lot of pain for several months. The procedure was followed by four weeks of physical therapy.

I also gave attention to the pain I suffered from rheumatoid arthritis. The doctor put me on a strong medication that suppressed my immune system. But that did more harm than good. By September, parasites had taken over my gut; now it was my turn to be hospitalized. I returned home just in time to prepare our house for a hurricane. After the storm passed, I was back in the hospital. They put me on a strong antibiotic; it and the disease itself caused severe diarrhea. I was bedridden for weeks, too weak to even pray. The best I could do was imagine myself resting on Father God’s lap.

Faith tells us that there is a much bigger picture than what we know or understand. Faith tells us that God is working a plan — and it’s okay to not understand it. I definitely did not understand, but I was grateful that I didn’t feel abandoned by God.

By December, my diarrhea had mostly stopped but Ralph’s was increasing. Back to the hospital for tests! The doctor diagnosed him with ulcerative colitis and put him on medications that made life a little better. Meanwhile, I spent the first two months of 2023 in physical therapy for my back.

In March, Ralph went to the hospital to have a procedure done to his heart because the cardiologist couldn’t get his A-fib under control. Post-operative medication triggered non-stop diarrhea; little did we know that it was the beginning of the end.

In April we had to cancel our Easter plans. In June, we couldn’t go to a restaurant to celebrate his birthday. I watched the 4th of July fireworks with his sister, feeling bad that Ralph was stuck at home. But he did have some good days and we managed to do a few fun activities; we hoped that he was on his way back to a more normal life.

Hope is the first fruit of trusting God. It give us relief from depression, despair, and discouragement. However, if we turn hope into expectations, we are likely to become disappointed because God has different ideas. His ways are higher than our ways — and we don’t like that. We want to control the outcome of our prayer requests.

Ralph and I hoped that our trust in God would soon bring an end to the long series of crises. Sadly, in November we had to cancel our plans for Thanksgiving and our 48th wedding anniversary. We barely had any Christmas. Ralph was hospitalized four times. They removed his colon. While convalescing at home, blood in his urine put him back in the hospital for the last time. From there he went to a rehab center. He had lost a lot of weight and became quite weak. After two weeks of physical therapy and expecting steady improvement, his kidneys stopped working, which stopped his heart

Jesus came to take him to a perfect and complete healing; Ralph gave him his total surrender.

Left behind and in shock, I too had to give Jesus my total surrender. Whether by the death of the body or the death of our expectations, there is always something new and good that God guides us into after we’ve surrendered our ideas of how life should be. After a very long journey of unusual hardships, using my trust in God as a walking cane, when the unthinkable happened, I heard God say that the journey was over. It was time for a new journey, a new life, doing the unexpected.

I’m still grieving. I’m still in transition, but the dawn is getting brighter. God has brought me a new best friend, a ministry to young adults in my parish, and a new companion to accompany through RCIA. If the doctors can solve the problem of my back pain (please pray for this), I hope to finally go on an adventuresome vacation to round out my restoration process. I wonder if God will give me a travel buddy.

Surrendering leads to a new understanding of God’s love. He covers us with a comforting compassion that doesn’t stop all evil but instead guides us from tragedies to triumphs, from suffering to recovery. That’s where trust will take you.

I share my story with you, not for pity but to reassure you that God is, because of his infinite goodness, a redeemer who overcomes what is evil by making good come from it. Remember, hope is not wishful thinking; it’s the awareness of God’s goodness. And trust is not a feeling; it’s a decision of faith.

© Terry A. Modica, Good News Ministries

P.S. Here’s a rosary meditation on finding God amidst trials @ gnm-media.org/when-disaster-hits-find-god.

And here’s a prayer that will bless you: Pray the “Our Father” for Victory Over Evil @ gnm.org/prayers/our-father-victory-over-evil

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