Episode Transcript  

One

Most Paradoxical Beatitude

Of all the things Jesus says, which do you think sounds the strangest? Like when He called the Syrophoenician woman a dog. Or when He said that to be His disciple, you have to hate your father and mother. Or when He said that we have to eat His body and drink His blood to have eternal life. But one of the things Our Lord said that sounds the most like a contradiction in terms is the second beatitude, “When He says, “Blessed” or “Happy are those who mourn.”

By definition, those who mourn aren’t happy, right? Sadness, sorrow, is the opposite of happiness. Yet there it is, right at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. “Blessed are those who Mourn.” “Happy are the Sorrowing.”

Why? What about sorrow is a blessing? What is there about mourning that makes for happiness?

Two

Sorrow as the Right Response to Evil

The first thing to notice about this Beatitude is that it completely refutes those who say that suffering is the primary problem of human life. Suffering isn’t the problem. Evil is the problem. Badness is the problem. And it’s actually a good thing to suffer when we encounter something evil, something that’s bad for us.

Like, it’s a bad thing for a kid to put his hands in fire and it’s a good thing that he feels the pain when he does that. That pain is the appropriate response to what is bad for him, and it helps him stop putting his hands in fire again. 

The incapacity for suffering would be a terrible thing. It would mean we couldn’t feel the pain and guilt at our own sins, we couldn’t feel compassion for another’s misfortune, and we couldn’t feel dissatisfied at the emptiness of a godless life. 

No, suffering isn’t evil. Evil is evil. And if evil is present, then it’s appropriate to experience sorrow. It’s appropriate to mourn. That goes especially for the ultimate evil, the source of all other evils. What we should mourn especially is the evil of sin.

Three

Mourning Sin 

To experience sorrow when you encounter evil is not only a good thing, but as we just saw, it’s a sign that your humanity is intact. That said, our sorrow should be proportionate to the evil. We shouldn’t be having huge bouts of mourning or getting all depressed every time anything goes wrong. Jesus doesn’t say, “Blessed are those who get really upset over every little thing.”

What that means, in practice, is that our greatest mourning should be over sin, since sin is the greatest evil; we should respond to sin with our greatest sorrow. 

So is that where we actually mourn the most? Is that the point where we actually become most sad? Or do we get upset about worldly misfortune, when something goes wrong financially, medically, professionally, or in terms of our reputation? Is that when we really get sad? Or do we actually reserve our greatest sorrow for the fact of sin in our lives and the lives of others? Because that’s the only way our sorrow, our mourning, is blessed.

Four

Using Sorrow to Overcome Sin

Sorrow isn’t just a response to evil. The very unpleasantness of sorrow is a motivator, a source of energy, for getting rid of evil and avoiding evil in the future. The pain of getting your hand burned makes you pull it out of the fire, and motivates you not to put your hand in the fire again. So sorrow for sin, the mourning Jesus calls blessed, should be leveraged to help overcome sin.

This happens when we’re mourning over the sins of those we love. Like, for instance, if you have a kid who has left the Church, or is struggling with some addiction. Then your sorrow and concern for that kid can lead you to a resolution where you pray for that kid every day, or even make some habitual sacrifice of food or drink or comfort, in order to contribute to your kid’s struggle in overcoming the evil of apostasy or addiction.

And, of course, the sins we have the most control over are our own. So those are the sins we should mourn primarily, since our sorrow has the best opportunity to remove our sin. The point is, don’t mourn over sin and then do nothing about it. Let your sorrow for sin flow into a resolution to fight that sin in some concrete way. And then your mourning will have indeed been a source of blessing. Your mourning will have been a spur to happiness, and you will be comforted.

Five

Mourning as a Reconfiguration to God

Physical pain forces our attention; it pierces, it interrupts. But spiritual pain is easier to ignore. We numb it, justify it, or distract ourselves from the quiet sorrow that follows sin. Yet that sorrow is a gift. When we mourn rightly, our sadness becomes a spiritual alarm, waking us up, calling us back to God.

But for that to happen, we have to slow down and listen. When you feel anxiety, anger, emptiness, don’t bury it. Let it speak. Ask: What have I done that was wrong? What good did I fail to do?

Then let your mourning move you. Be honest. Tell those you’ve hurt that you are sorry. Most of all, go to Jesus in Confession. Tell Him everything. Receive His mercy. And in that moment, when sorrow becomes repentance, and repentance meets mercy, then the promise is fulfilled, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

Suggested Resolutions:

Choose one resolution for today to help you grow closer to God, or create your own. Here are some ideas to inspire you. 

• At the end of each day, ask yourself, where do you actually mourn the most? Do you get the most upset about worldly misfortune when something goes wrong financially, medically, professionally, or in terms of our reputation? And how do you need to learn to reserve the greatest sorrow for spiritual evils?

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