“For it was fitting that (God), for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the leader to their salvation (Jesus) perfect through suffering.” (Hebrews 2:10). To become “perfect through suffering” sounds crazy at first. Who wants to suffer? No one does. Yet suffering is part of human life and it can be a prime teacher of wisdom.
On Jan. 20, Joe Biden was inaugurated as president of the United States. About two weeks earlier, on Jan. 3, Congressman Dan Lipinski, the representative from Illinois’ 3rd District, ended his last term in Congress after being defeated in his party primary in March 2020. Both men are baptized Catholics. Both men are members of the Democratic Party, which has historically enjoyed broad Catholic support. Yet in the same month the political career of one man reached its height while that of the other came to an end. An important reason for the difference in the political fortunes of Joe Biden and Dan Lipinski is the different choices each politician has made about how to live his faith and moral beliefs in public life.