Suffering and Redemption in the Soul of A Woman

Women have a very unique sense of love and suffering. They innately feel empathy for other people, wanting to somehow be “a mother” to them in their hurts and pains. The heart of a woman carries the world within it, as it sometimes seems. How and why is that? Men certainly do not “feel” as women do, do not instantly want to hold close a child or even a friend to comfort and caress when they see him in distress.

 
If are to start there, the differences between men and women, there are some obvious explanations. Both men and women were made to love and to give love to others; they were both made to understand, enjoy, and create in the world around them according to God’s design; dominion over earthly things was given to both Adam and Eve in the Garden before the fall. But looking at characteristics concerning the body, men, in general, tend towards protection and rule, fighting and conquering — in other words, the exterior motives of life and family, of safeguarding what is dear to them. Women, on the other hand, are motivated in the areas of procreation and posterity more than men, needing their bodies and their lives to be cherished, guarded, and preserved. Women have a particular perception of the good in the world around them, naturally drawing beauty to reveal itself in all aspects of life. Edith Stein, a philosopher and Carmelite Nun who died during the holocaust of WWII, wrote extensively on the nature of women, pointing out that “we are trying to attain insight into the innermost recesses of our being, we see that it is not a completed being but rather a being in the state of becoming, and we are trying to achieve clarity relative to the process.” (Edith Stein, Essays on Women) Women are connected to life and growth in a way men are not: through their wombs. The woman’s body is created for the nurturing of new life and gentle development of another person. Even when not aware of it, women understand what it means to grow into one’s full potential, which is what men seem to unanimously be drawn to achieve in the presence of women (whether they are aware of it or not as well). But what does this have to do with the keen sensitivity to suffering which women possess?

 
“I will set enmity between you and the woman, your offspring and hers; her descendants will tread on your head, and yours lie in wait for her heel.” This prophecy of Genesis 3:15, I believe, is the key to understanding the suffering of women. Edith Stein also poses this passage as an element to take account of — Does this mean that women have the specific duty to struggle against evil? Yes, evil is all around, attacking the Church through both men and women. Suffering and trials come to both men and women and both need to fight valiantly for the Heart of Christ in the world. But Christ was born of a woman, of Mary, and it is through her that He decided to accomplish His plan of salvation. God decided to make the woman necessity for the redemption of humanity, precisely through the life-giving gift of her womb. “A promise of redemption is present inasmuch as the woman is charged with the battle against evil,” as Edith Stein puts forth. The root of evil lies in a perverted relationship with God, a disordered love and communion directing the person away from Him who is Love and Communion Itself…but the woman herself is not the cause of such evil, as is often interpreted by Eve’s taking of the forbidden fruit. Rather, Eve portrays how the response of women in the face of evil has the greater impact. Women, in general, possess a singular sensitivity to moral values and an abhorrence to that which is low and mean. She is “the master of her own mystery,” as John Paul II states. If Eve’s decision to succumb to temptation affected the entirety of human history, then the response of all women throughout time since that moment is able to affect the course of that evil, enough to crush the serpent’s head. Mary, the Mother of God, is the perfect example of Woman’s response in the face of evil. Sharing in the sacrificial death of her Son brought redemption to the rest of humanity. “Redemption is a truth, a reality, in the name of which man must feel himself called, and ‘called with effectiveness.’ He must become aware of this call.” (JPII, Theology of the Body, 46:4) Again, this sense of becoming, of the growth of life, is part of the woman’s vocation expressed in her nature. If she can experience suffering and pain in such a keen and unique way, she has the capacity to respond more effectively than men to the redemptive reality of that suffering.

If you wish to know modern examples of redemptive suffering, Chiara Corbella Patrilla is one woman to look to. Originating from Rome, Italy, she married Enrique Patrilla in 2011. Her first pregnancy brought great sorrow, for the life of the child was not expected to last more than a half hour after birth. Chiara and Enrique knew the value of the gift of life in this child and decided to accompany him as long as they were able. The doctor’s prediction was true, the child passing away only a half hour after birth. The same events happened with the second pregnancy — knowing he would die, they accompanied him as long as they could, and the child died a half hour after birth. Holding on to God’s faithfulness, they conceived a third child. This time, it was Chiara who was in danger of death, being diagnosed with cancer. However, since the child was healthy, she withheld any treatments until after birth. About year after delivering her son, Chiara herself died from the cancer in 2012. The evening before her death, Enrique asked her, with tears in his eyes, if what Christ said is true about His yoke being easy and His burden light. Chiara met his eyes, saying, “Yes, my burden is easy, and my yoke is light.” 

 
A second example and even closer to contemporary times is Elise Charbonnet Angelette. Raised in Louisiana, United States of America, Elise lived a joyful life with her husband Jason and five young children, teaching and living out the Theology of the Body as expressed in the writings of John Paul II. Elise and Jason traveled around the State giving retreats and seminars to couples and families, often spent quality time with their own children, and encouraged creativity through the arts, such as theatre and dance. The middle of 2014 found her diagnosed with breast cancer, even as she was still breast-feeding their youngest daughter. After four years of intense treatments and suffering, Elise passed away in August of 2020. Her life, especially during the time of treatments, was marked with joy and patience in the faithfulness of God and service to others. Witnesses often describe their surprise with her deep empathy in THEIR sufferings rather than spiraling in her own. Her husband, Jason, attests her lived expression of 2 Timothy 4:7-8, “I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith.”

 
What did these women have in common? How are we to live as they did? John Paul II gives us an insight into this question: “Christ does not invite man to return to the state of original innocence, because humanity has left it irrevocably behind, but he calls him to find — on the foundation of the perennial and, one might say, indestructible meanings of what is ‘human’ — the living forms of the ‘new man’. In this way, a connection is formed, even a continuity, between the ‘beginning’ and the perspective of redemption.” (TOB 49:4) Suffering as entered into the condition of the human person, but it is the particular response of women that shapes the lives of society in the face of these evils. A sure confidence and hope in the redemption of Christ is what women were created to share with the world around them, helping the men of the human race to rise to their full potential as guardians of holiness. The keen empathy towards suffering which women have is not a burden, as some may interpret it, but a blessing and channel of grace, if the woman decides for it to be so.