The Paths to God

This Week's Quotation:

“There are only two major paths by which the human soul comes to God: the path of great love, and the one of great suffering.”

—Richard Rohr

The Paths to God

 

Rev. Berry Behr, Interfaith Minister

There are moments in life when the heart opens so wide with love that we glimpse something beyond ourselves. Holding a newborn child, standing beneath a vast African sky, watching strangers become friends around a sacred fire—suddenly the world feels connected, alive, and holy. Love softens our boundaries and reminds us that we belong to one another.

And then there is suffering.

Not the suffering we romanticize from a distance, but the suffering that arrives uninvited: grief, war, betrayal, illness, loneliness, fear. The suffering that strips away certainty and forces us to confront who we really are beneath the masks we wear so comfortably in easier times.

Richard Rohr suggests that both great love and great suffering are portals to a deeper truth. Perhaps this is because both experiences have the power to dismantle the illusion of separateness. Love draws us beyond ourselves willingly. Suffering often drags us there.

We live in a partisan world of “us” and “them,” yet suffering does not seem to recognize manmade boundaries. The tears of a grieving mother sound the same in every language. The prayers rising from broken hearts carry the same longing for peace, dignity, and safety.

This does not mean we ignore injustice or become passive in the face of violence. Compassion requires us to care deeply about human suffering wherever we encounter it. But perhaps there is another way to stand for justice without surrendering to hatred. Perhaps we can refuse to dehumanize perpetrators even while refusing to accept harm. Gandhi taught this, and many traditions encourage the same stance.

My work takes me into spaces where people from many traditions pray side by side. We do not all believe the same things. We do not even always speak the same language. Yet something profound happens in the space between us when we pray together. We recognize each other’s humanity, and we meet each other’s divinity.

Maybe that recognition is where healing begins.

Great love and great suffering may both invite us into the learning that we were never meant to walk this human journey alone. Perhaps the people in our lives are not so much obstacles or allies as companions on a shared journey toward God.