Walking With My Brother

When our children – no matter their ages – are in pain, we feel all of it and more. Their hurt, their helplessness, their humiliation, their soul searching all become ours, along with a sense of guilt and remorse. What could I have done better to shield them from, prepare them for this struggle? What can I do now to help them carry this burden? What should I do?

As our children grow into their adulthood, while we parents grow increasingly comfortable in our nearing retirement, money and things are often the easy way to avert a current crisis. Money, though, is often not what is needed most. More difficult, is arriving at that time in our children’s lives, when we find that their burden — their cross — is something heavier, which they have to bear, as we stand by — with little ability to exercise any control or influence — and watch.

As I was praying the Rosary this morning, we were meditating on the Sorrowful Mysteries. They all seemed to pertain. The 4^th mystery in which Jesus is carrying His cross made this lesson particularly vivid.

We know that Jesus’s mother, Mary, was nearby, as He carried His cross to Calvary. She was likely moving with Him along His path feeling each step of Jesus’s way as an arrow piercing her heart. Yet, she could do little more than watch and mourn for Him and His pain. She was helpless to do more than to be there at the last to receive Him in His brokenness and wait for our Father’s work to be completed in Him…for His resurrection into new life.