De utilitate adversitatis.

The Healing Gift of Opposition

Adversity and unjust criticism draw the soul back to humility and inward reliance on God rather than worldly hope.

It is good for us to bear burdens and opposition now and then, because these things often call a person back to the heart, so that he may recognize that he is in exile, and not place his hope in anything in this world.¹ It is good that we sometimes endure opposition, and that people think badly and imperfectly of us, even when we act well and mean well. These things often help us toward humility, and protect us from vainglory. For then we seek God more earnestly as the inner witness, when we are despised by people outwardly, and not well thought of.

Rooted in God Through Affliction

Affliction reveals our utter dependence on God, drives us to prayer and longing for Christ, and exposes the impossibility of lasting peace in this world.

Therefore a person ought to ground himself wholly in God, and it should not be necessary for him to seek out many consolations. When a person of good will is afflicted, or tempted, or distressed by evil thoughts, then he understands how much more necessary God is to him — without whom, he declares, he can do nothing at all.^✦ He groans and prays for the miseries he endures. Then he grows weary of living any longer; he longs for death to come, so that he may be dissolved and be with Christ.^✦² Then too he sees clearly that security and full peace cannot stand firm in this world.

Read the original Latin

Bonum nobis est, quod aliquando habeamus aliquas gravitates et contrarietates, quia sæpe hominem ad cor revocant, quatenus se in exilio esse cognoscat, nec spem suam in aliqua mundi re ponat. Bonum est quod patiamur quandoque contradictiones, et male et imperfecte de nobis sentiatur, etiamsi bene agimus, et intendimus. Ista sæpe juvant ad humilitatem, et a vana gloria nos defendunt. Tunc enim melius interiorem testem Deum quærimus, quando foris vilipendimur ab hominibus, et non bene de nobis creditur.

Ideo deberet se homo totaliter firmare, et non esset ei necesse multas consolationes quærere. Quando homo bonæ voluntatis tribulatur vel tentatur aut malis cogitationibus affligitur, tunc Deum magis sibi necessarium intelligit, sine quo nihil omnino se posse testatur. Gemit et orat pro miseriis quas patitur. Tunc tædet eum diutius vivere, mortem optat venire, ut possit dissolvi, et esse cum Christi. Tunc etiam bene advertit securitatem et plenam pacem in mundo non posse stare.

Scripture echoes

↩John.15.5 — I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who abides in me, and I in him, this one bears much fruit; for apart from me you can do nothing.
↩Phil.1.23 — But I am hard-pressed between the two, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for it is far better;

Notes

1 ↩ad cor revocant: literally 'call back to the heart' — the lexeme policy renders cor as 'heart' for inner attention/conscience/will; here it signals a turning inward toward self-knowledge before God.
2 ↩The quoted span 'possit dissolvi, et esse cum Christi' is a direct echo of Philippians 1:23. The connective ut here is purpose ('so that'), and cum with the ablative ('cum Christi') is rendered as 'with Christ' following the Pauline idiom.