I have just been reminded by someone that suffering is a form of spirituality in which one identifies with the sufferings of Jesus. I take this teaching as it is, no questions asked. But the more I think about it, the more I feel that there's more reflection to be done on suffering.

I think there's one thing that might be even more challenging than suffering itself, and that is, journeying with the suffering. In a sense, a sufferer has no choice but to suffer. But a person journeying with a sufferer has to will himself into self-denial in order to journey with the suffering and to partake in that suffering together; to choose to suffer even when he doesn't have to.

When accompanying people who are suffering, our desire to be fellow sufferers wares off over time. Journeying with people who suffer is a very tiresome experience, especially when we cannot really understand how their predicament feels.

When journeying with sufferers, we are most often confronted with our own inability to empathise for extended seasons of time. We can empathise only for as long as our own patience permits. It’s not difficult to “help” a sufferer for a limited duration; it really doesn’t take very much out of us. The test comes when we have to share life with a sufferer.

The durability of our patience is a rather apt indication of the extent of our love for another person over our love for ourselves.

When the journey of accompaniment gets too wearisome, we turn away from the sufferer to ourselves and we throw in the towel. Instead of asking, “What about the sufferer?”, we begin asking, “What about me?”

Suffering is something spiritual. But to choose to suffer with the suffering is deep spirituality. It's for those who truly love.