– Kenneth Crotty

I asked the hidden voice within my mind: why pain?

And He said ‘So there would be no pain’…

    And in the silence that followed, I wondered upon those words …

Pain, He said, is not the beginning of punishment, but of peace.

Pain is how I teach you that a certain course of action or attitude is wrong.

And the pain is not my punishment, but a goad to bring you peace…

So remember pain is love in disguise.

If I did not love you there would be no pain;

    Nothing to bring you happiness and back to me.

But because, sometimes, you ache with the dull ache of nebulous pain and

    See not end to its goal.

    My own heart also aches.

For no real father ever wishes to see his child in misery.

Hear the voice of my love, then, calling you through pain and begin to live.