Delores Williams on the Danger of Glorified Suffering

When we can’t eliminate suffering, we often try to give it a positive value. But what if that winds up rationalizing injustice? What if glorified suffering only legitimizes oppression? What if “meaningful” suffering is the last thing marginalized communities need? Womanist theologian Delores Williams raises these questions with respect to her own Christian tradition in the following excerpt from Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk.

Quote

[.alt-blockquote]“There is nothing divine in the blood of the cross ... As Christians, Black women cannot forget the cross, but neither can they glorify it. To do so is to glorify suffering and to render their exploitation sacred. To do so is to glorify the sin of defilement ...[.alt-blockquote]

[.alt-blockquote]Women must question [this] way of seeing such positive value in oppressed Black women identifying with Christ through their common suffering wrought by cross-bearing. Black women should never be encouraged to believe that they can be united with God through this kind of suffering. There are quite enough Black women bearing the cross by rearing children alone, struggling on welfare, suffering through poverty, experiencing inadequate health care, domestic violence and various forms of sexism and racism.”[.alt-blockquote]

—Delores Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness, 167, 169

Questions

• What dangers do you see in glorifying self-sacrificial human suffering?
• Have you ever experienced or witnessed language about suffering being weaponized against certain communities?
• Do you think comparing human suffering to divine suffering dignifies or degrades human pain? Why or why not?
• Can we attribute any dignity to suffering without risking rationalizing injustice?
• How might one acknowledge without encouraging suffering as Williams hopes to do?
• How would you see suffering differently when viewed as a reflection of divine suffering?
• How might you meet with God if not through a shared experience of suffering?

Context

• Delores Williams' Sisters in the Wilderness
• Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most, Chapter 11: …And There's No Fixing It

Pairs Well With

• Commitment to social change in order to reduce suffering
• Belief in the inherent dignity of human beings

Pairs Poorly With

• Christian martyrdom traditions
• The belief that “everything happens for a reason”