Prayer: “Suffering Unites People in Solidarity and Draws Them Near to God” by Oscar Romero

Holy Week is a call to follow Christ’s austerities, 

the only legitimate violence, 

the violence that he does to himself 

and that he invites us to do to ourselves: 

“Let those who would follow me deny themselves,” 

be violent to themselves, 

repress in themselves the outbursts of pride, 

kill in their hearts the outbursts of greed, 

of avarice, of conceit, of arrogance. 

Let them kill it in their hearts. 

This is what must be killed, 

this is the violence that must be done, 

so that out of it a new person may arise, 

the only one who can build a new civilization: 

a civilization of love.

 

Suffering will always be. 

It is a heritage of the first sin 

and a consequence of other sins that God permits, 

even after the redemption. 

But the redemption converts them 

into power of salvation when suffering is undergone 

in union of faith, hope, and love 

with the Redeemer’s divine suffering and cross. 

Suffering is the shadow of God’s hand, 

which blesses and pardons; 

and suffering unites people in solidarity 

and draws them near to God.

 

St. Oscar Romero was martyred on March 24, 1980 while celebrating Mass in his Cathedral in San Salvador.