Sirach 31:13 "Remember that a greedy eye is a bad thing. What has been created more greedy than the eye? Therefore it sheds tears from every face."

I never thought of my tears as being a sign of greed, but as I think about this, I can kind of see what Sirach is talking about. In recent times of suffering, a friend and I often discussed why God gave us emotions. We have both suffered tremendously over the last few years, but we both also have very pressing duties to others that demand our full attention and clear thinking. In the worst times of suffering, we knew what we had to do, but our emotions were so strong that they were getting in the way of our duties. Why did God allow this? What was the point of these emotions? I did not really have an answer, other than the fact that I had been learning Ignatian discernment, and was coming to understand how our emotions are one way God and the "good spirits" guide us in our decision making.

My friend and I both had our times of tears during all of this, we still do, but we never let the tears take over. We let them out, and then move on. Often, though, when I lapse into crying, it feels self-indulgent. Like I am giving in to my anguish when God wants me to buck up, accept my cross, and move forward. Then I quickly wipe the tears away and try to do just that. To her credit, my friend does not seem to give in to the tears as often as I do, I think she is further along the path of suffering than I am (and she certainly has suffered much more than I have).

That self-indulgent feeling of mine is, I think, one way this "greedy eye" Sirach talks about manifests itself. When I spend my time crying over things or situations, it's because I feel a loss. But God would not take these things away if He did not have something better in store. So my tears are really a sign of attachment, especially when I give into them frequently. Attachment can and does inspire greed for the thing to which we are attached. We can't get enough of that person or thing, it becomes the balm to our souls that God is meant to be (an ineffective balm, at that).

To be fair, though, we are human and we have been created with emotions. Without them, we could not love as God does. Even Jesus wept when Lazarus died. Our emotions, then, are somehow part of us being created in God's image. But Jesus did not dwell on His pain or the loss of Lazarus. Instead, He showed us how better things are coming. He raised Lazarus from the dead, as He will with all of us.

So there is crying in Christianity, but not the crying of disordered attachment. We are to trust God's plan in all things. Even though it is normal to feel the pain of loss and to express it with an occasional bout of tears, we cannot cling greedily to the things, or even people, of this world, and descend into abject sadness when we lose them. We really are an Easter People - we know how this ends, and it is all joy!