Why is it that we turn to the saints when Jesus Himself said in John 14:6 “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Why go to another, when we have that amazing knowledge that we can go directly to Jesus with our problems?
I pondered this question in my heart, and I wish to share with you the insight that came.
The saints (who are persons just like you and me) have gone through ‘hell on earth’. You may not think that when you see glorified visual representations of them with a halo around their heads. If you read a short biography on their lives though, you’ll discover that they went through some form of suffering, some incredibly intense and unimaginable.
We too have some form of suffering that comes our way. And when we seek help from physicians or counsellors for example, we mostly get the treatment or management we need. But there is still some form of emptiness and loneliness within us, as we feel those who’ve helped us ‘don’t really know what it truly feels like enduring this form of suffering?’ Simply because they haven’t been in our shoes.
Now, one can say, ‘but Jesus knows your sufferings as He has been through it all. Look at His battered body on the Cross’. One is not wrong in saying that. But sometimes we may see Him on that Cross and not ‘feel’ it immediately. And God knows this for He knows our hearts and thoughts. He knows that we are more likely to ‘feel better’ when we speak to or look at someone who is going through the same or a similar experience. That’s why He gives us the saints, who are now eternally in His presence in Paradise. Each saint has been in a particular situation or endured a form of suffering which we can identify with in some way. Take St. Gianna Beretta Molla (1922 – 1962) for example, the patron saint of mothers, wives, physicians and unborn babies. Now one who is either a parent or a spouse or a doctor or had a complicated pregnancy or endured a miscarriage can look at her, identify with her and take note of how she conducted her life driven by her faith and coped with her suffering.
That’s the beauty of having the saints who we can turn to for help in our own situations and suffering. When we turn to them by reading up on their lives and asking for their prayers, they come to our aid by pointing and leading us to Jesus, Who helped them cope with their sufferings, healed them and brought them true peace and joy when they lived on earth.
Thus, God in His perfect wisdom and providence has provided us with the saints as a way of drawing us to Him, so that He can help us cope with our sufferings, heal us, and give us peace and joy amidst the torrents in our lives.
-Yvonne Rego
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