Would Angels Envy Us?

If angels could envy, they would envy our suffering. If angels could commit a sin, they would commit this one of the seven capital sins and not invent their own. If angels were not themselves, they would be somebody else. If angels were as little as we are and fit into time the way we do, they would waste their time in this way. If angels could fall and repent a hundred times a day as we do, their falls would look like this kind of human fall and not another. If angels were capable of a particularly pointless and selfish vice, one that wishes harm on another because of resentment, they would resent us and wish us harm because we are beings that can be harmed. If angels were as bad as we are or worse, they would be as bad or worse in this way.

Then again… some angels are worse. Some angels did sin, and they are still sinning now– the reason they had only one chance is because they are outside of time, in the eternal Now where your yes is always yes and your no is never. They only had one choice because there is only one Now. They fell like lightning from the sky then and are still falling now, for they are voluntarily rocketing away from God, but God is everywhere present and fills all things, and there is nowhere to hide from His love.

And what was their sin? It was pride, and it was also envy. Wishing to be like God in ways that they were not. Envying the little ones who were to come, whom they were to serve, even though the angels were greater than we. Resenting that a woman, a being embodied, a thing made not only of spirit but of meat and blood, would bear the Son when the Son came to be one with His beloved. Resenting that the Son Himself would become meat and blood instead of angel. Resenting us because we are little, envying us because God wished to make us great in our littleness.

Those angels could envy, and they did envy us, but not for suffering. Suffering had not come to be, yet.

And so the angels fell. And so they tried to drag us with them, and so Man was deceived, and fell from grace. But we are smaller than the angels. The angels did not think to envy us for that, but perhaps they should have. Because we are smaller, we exist in time. Because we exist in time, we can repent. And the Son came to Earth to become a thing like us, a thing not only made of spirit but also of meat and blood. Because we had made ourselves mortal, He chose to die. Because we had made ourselves beings that can suffer, He chose to allow Himself to suffer whatever we wished to inflict on Him. He freely chose to die if we would freely choose to kill Him, and we did. And the Son took what we gave Him– suffering and death– and bore it down into hell where the fallen angels are still descending to escape His love, and then bore it up again into the Heavens where the Father sits in glory among the angels that never sinned. The Son took our suffering and made it His own. And so our suffering has value, more value than mortal or angelic tongue could tell, because our suffering belongs to Christ.

But it remains suffering. It remains a bad thing. It remains a condition our Father wishes we could be without, and a condition that will pass away when all things are set right.

I can’t explain to you what suffering is. The mystery is too vast; there are no words to do it justice. But I can fumble at it, like a blind man fumbling to know what an elephant is, and I can tell you one aspect of suffering, and not be wrong. This is part of what suffering is.

The good angels are in Heaven now, and are not blind. They see as God sees; they see rightly. They see all where we see part, and they can see how it seems to us. They see suffering as bad, because it is, and they see it as valuable, because it has been made valuable. Suffering is something they wish we could be without. They’re joyful at the glory God brings out of suffering, but they don’t see suffering as good because it isn’t. The angels see my pain and yours more clearly than I ever could. They know the value of my suffering, but they also know that I can’t see that and can’t be expected to see, little creature that I am. So they must feel for me, and empathize, and want to help.

Archangel Michael is probably thrilled every time I lean on that icon and tell him my woes.

He probably helps me bear my cross in a thousand ways I can’t see, every day.

He doesn’t look down his non-nose at me, because that’s pride. That’s a sin. That’s something the others did, the ones who have fallen and are falling still.

The evil ones who envy us don’t envy our suffering. They see the bad in it, and think they’ve scored a point against the eternal majesty of Heaven; I don’t think they can comprehend the value Christ gave suffering. Best not to bother with them. But don’t be afraid to go to the Heavenly angels. They don’t envy us for anything, but they do want to help. Ask them.

Don’t put icons under your pillow, though; it’s bad for the paint.

(image via Wikimedia Commons)