The Suffering of Love: Christ's Descent into the Hell of Human Hopelessness

by Regis Martin

Making sense of human suffering is a challenge in every age, and many a person confronted with man's inhumanity to his fellow man has lost his faith in a good God. The Holocaust, in particular, because of the scope of its ruthlessness, has raised the question for modern man: What kind of God allows the horrible and systematic murder of so many innocent people?

Quoting widely from Christian, Jewish and secular sources, Regis Martin makes an unflinching examination of this universal question on the meaning of suffering. By meditating on Christ's passion, death and descent into Hell, he asks us to consider anew the God who overcomes evil by plunging himself into the depths of human misery.

The author presents the arguments of those who say that because of the Holocaust, and other such numerous horrors in history, all human discourse is suspended, including that which presumes the existence of a good and all-powerful God. He responds with a penetrating discussion of the deeper meaning of Christ's life, passion, death and resurrection in relation to human suffering, and then uses the examples of modern martyrs of the Holocaust such as Edith Stein and Maximilian Kolbe to show the meaning of the sacrifice of their lives and so many others in the larger context of Christ's self-emptying for the sake of others.

Genres: Theology, Religion

254 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 1995

Reviews

[Jarvs heredia]

indeed, human suffering is like hell when you don't find God who is supposed to love you, keep you safe, care for you, and make you feel having a Father.. but in face of all human atrocities committed in the name of freedom and supremacy, when the powerless are being fed upon by beasts, abused, maltreated, with their dignity being put aside..why did God choose to remain silent..

God may not suffer the way we do but a person who cannot choose to suffer cannot be a person capable of love...God chose to suffer because he loved us so much..

until now.. this mystery baffles me.. but i know God must have a great plan.. even if his ways are really peculiar.. and even if his ways defy human logic and understanding..

[Jaime]

Beautifully written.

[Maria Halliday]

This is the single greatest book I have read on the love of God and on my own religious doubts. Highly recommended!