It is a stern message, but it need not be a grim one

From A Man in Full Pay-Back Mode by Jonathan Kay

During our interview, I asked Mr. Black about his Catholic faith, and how it had helped him deal with his reversal in fortune. “I accepted [the Pope’s] view that life is a cruciform, and we all suffer personally or through natural disasters, though we don’t know why,” he told me. “And only those people who have some faith imagine that there is a reason at all. It is a stern message, but it need not be a grim one — because it shows that there is some intrinsically worthwhile aspect to coping with suffering. At a certain point, there is no practical alternative. You either resist it and fight on or you roll over and give up.”