Chris Cuomo - Power of Personal Faith and Suffering

The following is Mr. LeBlanc's second response to Chris Cuomo's personal view of faith which he spoke about on his program "ABC News - Focus on Faith".

Click HERE if you first wish to view Mr. Cuomo's commentary on "Faith". When you arrive at ABC News Focus on Faith, scroll down to: "WATCH: The Power of Personal Faith - Chris Cuomo explains the power of faith in his own life."





Hello Chris.

I'd like to look closer at the problem of "suffering" because you framed "Faith" as being a type of utility regardless of what one may consider "Faith" to be; indicating it would have a value as long as it's useful in helping a person cope with difficulties in life.

First, to those who would disregard "Faith in Eternal Life" while mocking the existence of life beyond the grave, let them consider that where we are going in life is preceded by where we have come from. Let these people think back as far as they can in their memory, and then go beyond that point if they can. Let them go to that beginning of all things and then go backwards from there and they will meet the oblivion from which they came. Let their "superior intellect" mull that over as they mock life beyond the grave! And yet, we can say to them, here we are with existence and life! Let them then ask this question: "Is it more difficult to give someone existence and life out of the nothingness from which we came, or for the author of created reality to continue life beyond the grave after we have been given existence and life?" The call into being is irrevocable.

Another thing for us to consider is this, "Why should anyone be smug about a merciful God who would provide the means for our personal suffering to take on the value of "redemptive suffering"? This gives pause to consider the mercy of God because it is a simple fact that suffering in life is either dumb anguish or a stepping stone.

To be clear about "Faith", as I stated in my first commentary, the "object of Faith is in what has been revealed", not in our own fabrications. And this means, if one does not consider what comes after this life, any view of "Faith" is merely a man-made anesthetic that numbs the pain and suffering in this life until we draw our last breath. No one really wants to die, and such a view of faith never addresses the deepest question in our heart which is, "What comes after this life?" Given that your segment was with Fr. Beck, a Catholic priest, if you would indulge me, I would like to respond from a Catholic perspective to some of the points you made.

"Faith" that is not connected to the reality of Eternal Life, namely, Jesus Christ, is the equivalent of "hopeless faith". And it is because "Faith" is so intimately united to suffering that we are forced to consider "personal sin" and the suffering it causes others, as well as "redemptive suffering" that helps others in their journey towards Eternal Life.

Those who do not meet Christ in HIS agony and suffering will never understand the value of their own suffering and what it means for them not only in this life, but in the life to come.

This brings us to consideration of two things from a Catholic perspective:

* Co-Redemption
* Co-Intercession

At this point, we have to consider how Catholics view suffering in order to establish whether or not Jesus claimed that our suffering is made one with His own. We can do this by looking at what St. Paul tells us. We will find that he not only confirms the fact that Jesus suffers when we suffer, he goes further and speaks directly about Co-Redemption and Co-Intercession.

In Acts 9:4-5 we read:

4: 'And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute ME?"

5: "And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, "I am Jesus, whom you ARE persecuting;"

Please note, Jesus did not say:

* Why do you persecute those who believe in Me?
* Why are you persecuting My Church?
* Why are you persecuting My Friends?
* Why are you persecuting My institution?

Jesus said Paul was persecuting Him, in the "1st person".

Again, in Acts 22:7-8 we read:

7: "And I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, `Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"

8: "And I answered, `Who are you, Lord?' And He said to me, "I AM JESUS OF NAZARETH WHOM YOU ARE PERSECUTING (emphasis added)."

And in Acts 26:14-15 we read:

14: "And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, `Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It hurts you to kick against the goads."

15: "And I said, `Who are you, Lord?' And the Lord said, "I am Jesus WHOM YOU ARE PERSECUTING" (emphasis added).

This is indisputable scriptural evidence that Jesus tells us that the suffering of the faithful are united to His own suffering. St. Paul clearly understands that our suffering is joined to the suffering of Christ. And this means the suffering of Christ is not over and done with on Calvary. Paul even makes an explicit declaration about this as we shall see later on.

Continuing, we have the final Judgment where Christ said of the Sheep and the Goats, "For as often as you did it to one of these, you did it to ME". And "As often as you failed to do this for one of these, you failed to do it to ME".

Now, as I mentioned, as Christians, we need to know that our personal sin crucifies Christ over and over in our own heart.

In Hebrews 6:1-5, Paul makes it clear that when we fall into sin "after" baptism we are not to be "baptized" again. That would be to mock Baptism and Calvary. Furthermore, the graces that Christ gives to His faithful makes it very difficult for them to "apostatize" in conscience even when they fall into deadly sin. There is a difference between "apostasy and an apostate" and "sinner who does not deny the faith and is willing to repent.".

We see this in Hebrews 6:6. We read that when we do sin and fall away we are "re-justified" when we "repent", even after we mock and crucify Christ again with our sin.

It reads,

6: "And are fallen away: to be renewed again to penance, crucifying again to themselves the Son of God, and making him a mockery."

For anyone to argue that St. Paul is saying we do not sin after we are baptized makes Christ a liar. The "Just Man" sins seven times a day. To claim we cannot sin a deadly or non-deadly sin, or that we cannot lose our justification after being baptized, would be the equivalent of mocking Christ and His Church as we are about to see.

Let us look first at the power to forgive sins in the Sacrament of Confession for those who sin after they are baptized.

In John 20:21-23 we read:

21: "Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you."

22: "And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit."

23: "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained."

No one can refute this Scriptural evidence that Christ gave the power to forgive sins to His Apostles, and to whomever they ordained to do the same. In like manner as Christ had done for them, they conferred this Power to forgive sins to others whom they would send out after Christ ascended to the Father. This is in keeping with Christ's command that they do as He had done for them so that when they died the Power to forgive sins would remain in His Church through those who succeeded them.

Anyone who denies this Scriptural evidence that Christ did in fact give the power to forgive sins to men openly mocks Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Consider for a moment a person who refuses to acknowledge that Jesus gave men the power to forgive sins. Imagine them being present when Jesus conferred this power to the Apostles. Such a person would be trying to stop Jesus from doing this saying:

"Hold on Jesus! Don't you do that. I confess straight to you, not to men! By giving these men the power to forgive sins you are confirming the Sacrament of Confession in the Catholic Church is real and necessary. Don't you do that, I won't have it!"

What kind of a look would such a person receive from Christ? What would Jesus have said to such a person? Does anyone think that Jesus would have apologized to such a person and then admit He stands corrected by them? No, such a person would have received more than the withering scorn of His silence. The fact is, Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit into these men so that they would have the power to forgive the sins of men, sins which crucify Christ again and again because all sin crucifies Christ. In fact, this is Scriptural evidence that it is not Baptism alone that forgives both mortal and venial sin.

And it is worth noting that Jesus "breathed" on His apostles. This is particularly significant because there are only two times in Scripture that we see GOD breathing life into creation. We don't even see this "breathing" in regards to Baptism.

In Genesis 2:7 we read:

7: "then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being."

When Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit into the Apostles, we see God restoring life to His creation that had been dead to grace because of Adam's sin. It is "In and through His Church" that we find the breathe of God in the Sacrament of Confession which resurrects souls from the dead as He gives life once again where there was no life. And He does this through the men that He gave the power to forgive sins. In fact when a person goes to confession and confesses a deadly sin, the resurrection that takes place in that confessional is a greater resurrection than if all the bodies of every person who ever lived were to rise from the grave. At the final judgment, not all will resurrect to glory and grace! Some will rise to damnation. Whereas in the confessional there is a resurrection in grace and Eternal Life.

Jesus created the Sacrament of Confession in John 20:23, and this Sacrament is bound to the Church that He created in Matthew 16:19. And this means the faithful are bound to confess their sins to Christ's Priests.

Does this mean that we have to run to confession for every sin we commit and live in constant fear? No, not at all! We have a reason to rejoice in the Sacrament of Confession. If we have mortal sins on our souls, Christ will remove them through the Sacrament of Confession.

It is worth mentioning that many do not realize that Scripture speaks of sin that is deadly (mortal sin) and sin that is not deadly (venial sin).

In 1st John 5:16-18 we read:

16: "If any one sees his brother committing what is not a mortal sin, he will ask, and God will give him life for those whose sin is not mortal. There is sin which is mortal; I do not say that one is to pray for that."

Notice in this verse John said "I do not say that one is to pray for that" because in this case prayer is not enough. One MUST go to confession.

We see the distinction once again between mortal and venial sin in verse 17:

17: "All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin which is not mortal."

So, what does the Catholic Church mean when it refers to sin that is not deadly as "venial sin"? This kind of sin does not deprive the soul of divine grace which is the life of God in the soul. Venial sin is not serious enough for damnation because it is committed without full intent, or without understanding the seriousness of the sin, or if the sin does not involve grave matter or circumstances. But it's still wise to confess venial sins because they can lead to mortal sin.

The sacrament of confession not only forgives all sin, it fortifies the soul. It is a "bulwark" in His Church.

Furthermore, the apostle John tells us that we are sinners and that we must confess, and in case people need to be reminded, this applies to the baptized.

In 1st John 1:8-9 we read:

8: "If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us."

9: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

And Paul says the ordained have the "Ministry of Reconciliation."

In 2nd Corinthians 5:18 we read:

18: "And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation."

All of this means the reality of Calvary is not limited to several square feet of earth on which stood the cross upon which Christ was crucified to redeem the world. Redemption is universal. And just as redemption is not limited geographically, it is not limited by time or place. It is an event, a reality that is not over and done with because it is a reality that is present to all time and place. To deny this would be to deny the omnipresence of the Divine Person of Jesus who now reigns in glory simply because He lived an earthly life. He is God in time and outside of time, and all time is not only present to Him, his entire earthly life is present to all time because His entire earthly life is wedded to His Divine Person just as much as his reign in glory is present to all time and place. To deny this would be to deny the fact that He is God and Man not only in His earthly life, but in His heavenly reign in which He did not shed His Human nature once He assumed it. His human nature will remain consubstantially united to His Divine Person forever in Glory because He does not go back on a matter that deals with His own Person.

In fact, it is only when we come to exist as individuals that we meet the reality of Calvary that preceded our existence. And let us be clear about something. The fact that our sins crucified Christ is not a platitude, it is a reality. We could not have crucified Christ with our sins before we came to exist. To disagree with this is to say that those who never came to exist crucified Christ with their sins. It is not enough to say Jesus paid for your sins in advance. For your sins to crucify Christ they must meet the reality of Calvary, and that fact is a reality only because the reality of Calvary is present to all time and place and meets the sins we commit only when we come to exist.

Now that we have seen the role that sin has in the suffering of Christ, we are ready to look at the flip side of suffering, meaning, how is our suffering understood to be "Co-Redemptive, and Co-Intercession"? We need to see what it means to "suffer with Christ in our own hearts for the sake of others" as compared to "making Christ suffer in our own hearts when we sin."

First of all, the Apostle Paul explains that "co-redemption, and co-intercession" are realities that are rooted in the Power of God Himself. He even speaks of the "transcendent" power of God that makes this a reality.

In 2nd Corinthians 4:7-12 we read:

7: "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, to show that the transcendent power belongs to God and not to us."

8: "We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;"

9: "persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;"

10: "always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies."

11: "For while we live we are always being given up to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh."

12: "So death is at work in us, but life in you."

St. Paul speaks of this "treasure" and then goes on to speak of "earthen vessels" which are the faithful. But what is this treasure? It is the "union of suffering" where the suffering found in the faithful becomes "one with the suffering of Christ". That is the entire message in what Paul is saying here. And he confirms this by telling us it is the transcendent Power of God which unites the suffering of the faithful to Christ which makes this a reality. If the suffering of Christ is the only thing that can redeem man and give us life within, and it is, the only way Paul can say and confirm that "Death is at work in us, but life in you" is if our suffering is made one with Christ by His Transcendent power where it is offered as "one with Christ" to the Father. This is why Paul can say the faithful are "always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies".

This matter is dealt in more detail in the "Catholicism on Trial Series" in Book #2, the Catholic Mass, but, we've just seen Scriptural evidence where St. Paul makes it perfectly clear that in Christian suffering there is the reality of "Co-Redemption". This is only way he can say while, "Death is at work in us, but life in you".

St. Paul goes on to say in Romans 8:35-39,

35: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?"

36: "As it is written, "For thy sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."

Paul is identifying our sufferings joined to Christ who was led to the slaughter.

37: "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us."

38: "For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,"

39: "nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

We are "one IN the Lord IN the One Bread." We are "One in the suffering of Christ", and this is why Catholics understand the value of "co-redemption and co-intercession". And this understanding is paramount to Catholics when we offer our sufferings to Christ that He may unite them to His own in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is here that we meet the substantial reality of Calvary that is veiled upon the altar that we may become "one with Him" where the present world at any given time meets the reality of redemption.

And St. Peter tells us the same.

In 2nd Peter 1:4 we read:

4: "by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, that through these you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of passion, and become partakers of the divine nature."

Now we have to look at what St. Paul said about being co-redeemers.

In Colossians 1:24 we read:

24: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church."

Certainly, Paul is not saying the afflictions of Christ are insufficient, but it cannot be denied that he said his suffering makes up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ for the sake of His body. Now, we know that Jesus is the ONLY mediator between God and man, and nothing can ever do away with that fact. But, "Co-Mediation" is equal to saying "Co-suffering" that is joined to Christ is co-redemptive because, as we have seen, it is joined to Christ and made one with his own by His transcendent power.

And when we consider that Paul said he makes up what is lacking in the suffering of Christ, he is saying that he is offering his "quota" of suffering in his own life that Christ takes and joins it to His own suffering. And Christ does the same for each of us. He takes the sum total of all the suffering that each of us offers to Him (our own quota of suffering like Paul, regardless of who we are or when we live) and He makes it one with his own. And then, He offers it all to the Father as "one offering with His own suffering". So, in reality, every time we offer anything to Christ, and it does not matter what the material of the cross is that we offer, we are pinioned to the cross with Him and in Him, and He in us, and herein we see "co-redemption of the world".

Regarding "Intercession", in 1st Timothy 2:1, we read,

1: "I desire therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, INTERCESSIONS (emphasis added), and thanksgivings be made for all men."

Notice, Paul uses the word "intercessions". Does this mean Paul is saying that Jesus is not the only intercessor between God and man? Of course not! We go to Jesus in behalf of each other in prayer. This does not diminish Jesus. In fact, He commanded that we pray for each other, even for our enemies and this glorifies Him.

The last thing to consider for purposes of this commentary is this. Is it possible to see "Creature Comfort" in a different light? Consider what it means that the sinless Creator appreciates the consolation and company of the creature, in fact, sometimes that of a sinful creature! Is there any Scriptural evidence for this?

Yes, there is.

In Matthew 4:11 we read,

11: "Then the devil left him; and behold angels came and ministered to him.

And in Mark 1:13:

13: "And he was in the desert forty days and forty nights, and was tempted by Satan; and he was with beasts, and the angels ministered to him."

He even brought the Apostles with Him asking that they stay with Him for an hour because He knew He was about to undergo suffering that would cause Him to sweat blood.

And in the Catholic tradition we honor a gesture made by Veronica who was moved with compassion and wiped the face of Jesus when she, the sinful creature, saw the innocent one suffering. Whether or not one accepts this tradition is irrelevant because the underlying fact remains.

Since the entire life of Christ is present to all time and place because His earthly life cannot be separated from union with His divine person, we can be present to Him in Gethsemane still. And no matter what it is we suffer, we can go to Him, sinful creatures that we are, and say to Him, "Lord. I know I have caused you to suffer this, and I am sorry. But what I suffer right now I offer to you that you unite it to your own suffering, like Paul did. And if my carrying of this cross that I am suffering can in any way lightens the load you carry because of my sins, I take up my cross as you said we must do, and I will carry it with you like Simon who helped you carry your cross that resulted because of my sins."

What one discovers is that you and the Lord carry the same cross, Him in your suffering, and your suffering in His cross. And in fact, your suffering becomes the equivalent of Veronica's veil where He leaves an imprint of His face on your own suffering every bit as much as He would have regarding Veronica's veil. The imprint of His face appears in His faithful in the form of long suffering, patience, fortitude, charity, and all the rest of the virtues.

In the end there is a unitive love between Christ and the soul that lets Christ unite it to Him where Christ unites our suffering to His own suffering, and there is a look of love between the two where the sinful creature is sanctified by the gaze of the one who redeems.

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