In our local Catholic community, there have been a lot of griefs observed lately.

In Scripture we find reminders that God comforts those who mourn, is close to the brokenhearted, and promises eventual triumph over sorrow. And in Romans 12 when St. Paul gives counsel about what it means to be a Christian, he talks about attractive things like having genuine love and brotherly affection, rejoicing in hope, being hospitable, and being aglow with the Spirit, but he also counsels blessing persecutors and weeping with those who weep.

In the same chapter, he also speaks about the Church as one body in Christ, integrally part of one another. When it comes to the Body of Christ, we cannot dismember ourselves, excising the body’s members, without harming the whole. And likewise, we can’t choose just to “rejoice in hope” but ignore the call to “weep with those who weep.”

These marks of a Christian that St. Paul lays out are qualities that knit us together as a community, deepen bonds, and infuse our deepest identity. We are being woven together like a complex tapestry, and that weaving involves bright, beautiful colors and the piercing of a needle. Some indispensable part of being knit together in love involves piercing sorrow, and the more we bear each other’s sorrows, the more we are bound together in love.

This side of heaven, we will all face grief; it cannot be avoided. But somehow, our good God has woven great love into great tragedy. Not only in the consummation of his perfect love through the sorrow of the cross, but also by knitting his children together into one body, one community of love that bears one another’s burdens.

Should you too find yourself observing grief, look too for love. I promise it is there.