When sorrow and suffering deepen faith

Lessons in mercy and love from a fatal car accident

“Until you’ve suffered, you think that religion is really about trying to get it right —it becomes another achievement game — instead of an invitation to rely on Infinite Love and Mercy.” Fr. Rob Spaulding, Diocese of Cheyenne, Wyoming

“'Cause it was not your time; that's a useless line

A fallen world took your life

But the God that sometimes can't be found

Will wrap Himself around you

So, lay down, sister, lay down.” Bebo Norman, Rita (song)

Since 2005, the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows has marked a significant sorrow in my life and the lives of so many people I know. Nineteen years ago today, a car accident claimed the lives of two seminarians from my home diocese —the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas. I knew both of these men — Jared Cheek and Matty Molnar.

Jared (left) and Matty (right)

There is so much I, and those who knew these men, could write about the shock, grief, and pain surrounding their deaths. Today, I’m inspired to talk about how their deaths have revealed the tenderness of God during great sorrow and how suffering if we allow it to, can lead us to His incomprehensible mercy and love — how we can learn to feel what it means to be wrapped in love by God when it seems He’s nowhere to be found.

The accident that claimed the lives of Matty and Jared was the result of drinking and driving, involving only their car on the seminary grounds. The driver had had the least drinks of the group, and while the group made it back to seminary grounds safely, a peer-influenced decision to drive around the campus and accelerate speed led to incredible tragedy. Disappointment, confusion, and anger could have reigned here — and while those emotions and more were all present, mercy and God’s tenderness reigned then and now.

The parents of Jared and Matty not only forgave the driver, they testified at his sentencing, begging for leniency so that another life would not be destroyed. The driver — Fr. Rob Spaulding, who I quoted in the introduction of this article — went on to finish seminary and became a priest.

In the early years of his priesthood, he shared his story as a witness to the importance of listening to your conscience, good decision-making, and the immense power of mercy. Today, he says he tells the story of the accident more often in one-on-one pastoral counseling settings.

Fr. Rob Spaulding, Diocese of Cheyenne, Wyoming

“When I get to talk to somebody about what it’s like when the only thing left to do is to rely on God’s love and the love of others, it’s not just an intellectual statement,” Fr. Rob explained to me in a recent conversation. “I’ve come at a perspective of God from a theology of suffering – suffering that I’ve experienced and suffering that I’ve caused. God is present in everything, and sometimes it’s a challenge to discover how that is.”

As I look at the events surrounding this accident on September 15, 2005, nearly twenty years later, it’s not so difficult to see where God is in them. We know that God did not ordain the deaths of Matty and Jared. It was definitely not their time. But God didn’t let death and evil have the last word, either. Not even close.

In the days after the loss of Matty and Jared, many of us who knew them were college students spread around the country. When school wasn’t distracting us from our grief and confusion, many of us found solace in chapels on our campuses. There, we all knew we were closer to Matty and Jared and each other in the Eucharist than we ever were in their physical presence. Because of those moments, I understand in a very real way what it means for the Spirit to intercede with inexpressible groanings because I simply could not pray as I ought (Romans 8:26).

Further, the immense sorrow we all felt forged an intimacy between us that went deeper than we may have even felt at the time. As I told one friend recently, I still remember the precise place I was when he called me with the news; the things said when pieces of news were relayed by and discussed among friends, and the dozens of social media statuses sharing last conversations, scripture passages, and song lyrics begging for understanding and a miracle for Jared, who held on for 24+ hours before passing on September 16.

Those moments, these memories, they are to me what it looks like for the God who sometimes can’t be found to wrap Himself around us — in prayer, in friendship, and in understanding what it really means for God to work things “for the good of those who love him.” (Romans 8:28)

Lastly, the stunningly courageous faith and love of the Molnar and Cheek families in the face of great tragedy paved a path for a man whose sin could have destroyed him to become instead a spiritual father who preaches attentiveness to our consciences, the power of mercy, and the immense gift of freedom that can come from true surrender to God.

“I had never felt more free in my life than in a moment I had at the seminary following the accident and release from the hospital and jail,” Fr. Rob explained to me. “[The freedom] came from this sense that I have made such a mess of things that my will has nothing to do with how things will move forward. I had to just say, ‘Ok, my life is not in my hands in any way.’”

As a result of that surrender, in both accepting responsibility for his role in the accident and not letting the accident deter his discernment, thousands of other people have been led to a deeper and more abundant encounter with God through Fr. Rob’s priesthood.

“You know, I could wake up every day, hanging over me this horrible thing that happened where two of my good friends lost their lives,” Fr. Rob shared with me. “But that’s not what they would want, and I don’t think that’s what God would want.”

Fr. Rob Spaulding, Diocese of Cheyenne, Wyoming

Life was made more painful for so many people because of sin— yet the prayer lives of so many of us became profoundly purer and better as a result of it, too. People who have needed healing and freedom from their own suffering and shame have found a spiritual leader for that path through Fr. Rob. In my own life, friendships that may have faded in meaning or become forgotten became forever sacred connections through death and grief, despite life circumstances meaning that temporal contact has decreased in some of those relationships.

This is what it means to be held by a God who wants to wrap himself around us. This is what it means to accept great sorrow and suffering — to let it be part of our “yes” to follow God’s will at every moment of our lives.

Today’s feast, the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, is a call to remember the sorrow Mary accepted as the Mother of Christ. Particularly, it’s focused on seven sorrows of Mary in the life of Christ.

“[E]ach new suffering was received [by Mary] with the courage, love, and trust that echoed her fiat, let it be done unto me according to Thy word, first uttered at the Annunciation.”

To me, that was at least one of the calls of God for those of us impacted by the accident that took the lives of Jared Cheek and Matty Molnar — that we accept with courage, love, and trust the suffering and sorrow that accompanied this accident, that we understand that the accident was allowed to occur in our lives because God had a plan for goodness for His will and ours through it.

Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us that the things that break our hearts might serve as a great catalyst to greater intimacy with your Son; that we come to see that God really is in everything, even when it’s difficult to see Him.

"So....... like this lovely monk in the picture, so are our lives..... hobbling towards what they are headed for. don't rush. take your time. enjoy the scenery. life is worth living. God is good. smell the fresh air. pray. be holy. do what you are supposed to be doing. Love God, and do what you will.......... I hope it fits into God's plan. do what you can." Matty Molnar, September 2005