The hardest part of being Catholic is the Catholic relationship to suffering. Suffering burns off sin, we are taught. Suffering is a thing that saves us. It’s an offering we make. I wake at night thinking now about the children we’ve put in cages, and it hits me as if new. Why torment yourself? What purpose does it serve? No one cares about your grief here. God does not care about that. And your grief does not absolve you. Don’t imagine that it does.