“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”
– Matthew 5:43-44
At many points of your life, if not daily, you experience struggles because of your interactions with other people or wrongs you encounter within society. Perhaps you get cut off in traffic, someone takes your food from the fridge at work, you get excluded by people who you thought were your friends, you get injured in an accident by someone else’s behaviour, or you are discriminated against at work, school, or within your community.
Service to Marriage and Family is one of the pastoral priorities of the Archdiocese. Within marriage, there are many occasions that you and your spouse can wrong each other. You can forget to do something you agreed to, can be impatient with each other, get let down by unmet expectations, and the list goes on. Bearing wrongs patiently is one of the spiritual works of mercy to act charitably toward one another (see CCC 2447). Within your marriage, how can you and your spouse both bear wrongs patiently?
Even in unintentionally wronging each other, you and your spouse can easily be resentful towards or blame each other for struggles you experience. For instance, you may return home from work after a long and tiring day to see the house a mess and supper still needing to be started. It can be easy to think, “Why didn’t supper get started? Why didn’t I plan for this on the weekend, and why didn’t my spouse get this started? Now we have to wait even longer to eat!”
Then once you and your family all get to the table after you struggled to make a meal, you are met with complaints about the food resulting in feeling even more defeated. Bearing wrongs patiently can be a challenging work of mercy to live out, especially with being patient on a daily basis with yourself and the people you live with. Someone who does this seeks “patience, willingly riding through setbacks and focusing not on wrongs but on rights and reconciliation [which] is much more fruitful in the long run.”[1] It also requires “courage and a good starting point is to remind ourselves of the ways Christ has provided for us and forgiven us in the past, and reminding ourselves of this might make it a little easier to do the same for others.”[2] How do you and your spouse practically live this out within your daily lives?
In your marriage, you can jointly focus on how you repair your disagreements or wrongs. After all, bearing wrongs patiently does not mean that you are a doormat to be walked all over but responding in a patient manner. One way to do so is with repair attempts, which are “any statement or action—silly or otherwise—that prevents negativity from escalating out of control. Repair attempts are the secret weapon of emotionally intelligent couples—even though many of these couples aren’t aware that they are doing something so powerful.”[3]
These repair attempts include sharing:
- How you feel with each other (e.g., I am feeling sad, frustrated, or worried)
- That you need to calm down or stop (e.g., “I need your support right now,” “Can I take that back?,” or “Let’s take a break?”)
- Saying sorry (e.g., “What you are saying is…” and “I am sorry”)
- That you can accept part or all of your spouse’s perspective (e.g., “I agree with…”or “I see what you’re talking about”), and
- Showing appreciation for your spouse (e.g., “Thank you for…,” “I love you,” or “One thing I admire about you is…”).[4]
Furthermore, it is important that both of your core needs are being met. Ways that you can do this can include asking each other the following questions:
- “What do I need in a relationship in order to feel loved, happy, fulfilled, and secure?
- What do you need in a relationship to feel the same?
- Are you willing to meet my needs in this relationship?
- Am I willing to meet yours?”[5]
Once you have these questions answered, you should have an idea of what one another’s needs are, and why they are important. Then it is recommended that you both “reiterate why tending to this is important to you, be clear on your own boundaries and limits in meeting the need, communicate what your partner can expect from you going forward, and then check back with your partner that they understand your limits and are ok with them.”[6] Some compromising may be necessary so that both of your needs are met.[7] If you go through this process together, it can help you repair the wrongs done between you and your spouse to allow reconciliation to occur.
Other ways of bearing wrongs patiently include praying for the person who has harmed you, praying for the Holy Spirit to give you the fruit of patience, and going to confession for times you have struggled to be patient. You can also “place your hope in God so that you can endure the troubles of this world and face them with a compassionate spirit.”[8] Furthermore, if you are frustrated with someone, you can “step away from the situation, take a few deep breaths, pray the Our Father, asking God for patience.”[9]
One saint who was very patient in bearing wrongs is St. Julie Billiart, a French sister who founded the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, and lived through the French Revolution. St. Julie learned to read and write even though there wasn’t a school for girls in her village, and then at age 7 taught other children who were unable to afford to go to school.[10] In 1774, she suffered from shock after a shot was fired into her family home in an attempt on her father’s life, which resulted in a decline in her health to the point of being completely paralyzed by 30 years old after receiving poor medical treatment.[11],[12] “Julie would recognize God’s call in her sufferings and her friendships, as well as in the signs of her time, in her country devastated by political and religious upheaval, violence and ignorance.”[13]
With the French Revolution underway, St. Julie needed to go into hiding for secretly protecting her parish priest, and had to escape on at least two occasions. One of these times, “[w]hen revolutionaries surrounded the château [that she was hiding in for about a year], Julie and her niece escaped in a hay cart to Compiègne in 1792 where she suffered even more with the loss of speech. While in Compiègne, Julie experienced more anxiety and fear in this de-christianized city, occupied by many troops, and from the dispelling of her friends, the Carmelites, driven out of their convent. Sixteen of these Sisters would later be guillotined in Paris!”[14] Now those are significant wrongs that St. Julie lived through!
Despite all the sufferings and struggles she experienced, St. Julie was seen as a friend who helped others live with suffering and loss from the Revolution. She was also a spiritual support to others, a teacher of the faith to young people, and the founder of a religious congregation. St. Julie even “walked many roads in France and Belgium in founding communities of her Sisters and schools for young girls deprived of education at the time” (after she was healed of her paralysis of 22 years!).
After her congregation was established, the pastor of Amiens, where she founded the Sisters, did not approve of her travels and foundations so she moved to Namur in Belgium to deal with the wrong done to her and to continue her mission. After all, “she saw education for everyone as a basic human right, and teaching as the ‘greatest work on earth.’ She brought the good news and hope in the goodness of God to a depressed and deprived generation by preparing vulnerable children for their duties in life, when children cried out for survival.”[15]
St. Julie Billiart really is an excellent example of bearing wrongs patiently in her life and helping others to do the same. You can only image the patience St. Julie needed to not let the lack of education stop her from learning to read and write, be able to hide for years during the French Revolution, live with her physical disabilities, found a religious congregation despite opposition, and provide education to young girls who were deprived of it.
As you and your spouse take time to focus on how you can bear wrongs more patiently in your lives and in your relationship, hopefully you can increase your repair attempts and meet the core needs of each other to grow closer over time. May St. Julie Billiart’s witness assist you in seeing that you are not alone in your struggles from wrongs done to you and that you can persevere through them to follow the plans God has in store for both of you. St. Julie Billiart pray for us!
Please note, if you’re in an abusive relationship, it is encouraged that you seek the necessary help for yourself and your children by prioritizing your safety. For information on resources in Alberta, please call or text the Family Violence Info Line at 310-1818 (toll free) or visit https://www.alberta.ca/family-violence-find-supports
– Melissa Guzik is a registered psychologist who works in private practice in the Edmonton area. She is the co-author of the Catholic marriage preparation and enrichment book and workbook that were recently re-released: To Know, Love, and Serve: A Path to Marital Fulfilment: 2nd Edition. Melissa lectures at St. Joseph Seminary and presents in dioceses across Canada. Information about Melissa’s private practice can be found at www.melissaguzik.com
