Dedicated to all cancer patients

May 06, 2016

Dear Editor
I wish to dedicate this writing to all the brave warriors fighting against cancer.

I guess a thousand thoughts could have crossed one’s mind the moment he or she is “diagnosed” with cancer. It is certainly an experience beyond words: a state of shock, moving on to anger, depression, denial or acceptance, is absolutely normal. I believe that was why Jesus has walked before us into Gethsemane, enabling us to share His prayer that “if it were possible, the hour might pass from him” (Mark 14:35). This is, probably, the closest experience that one could have shared in the Lord’s feeling and emotion at life’s most threatening hour. But the height of such experience ought to end with Jesus’ prayer, “..yet not what I will, but what you will.”

The common medical treatments of radiotherapy and chemotherapy are a long and extremely difficult experience; they come with much pain and various side effects beyond description. Besides, there are many inconveniences which the patients and their family members, or friends, employer etc. will have to tolerate and endure. Such a moment calls for mercy from family and friends, lots of understanding and support. But to the ones who suffer, know that the Lord Jesus hears your cry, as you accompany Him on the road to Golgotha. By human definition, the crucifix itself is death but God has turned it into a victory for the believers through the resurrection of Jesus, that same cross of cancer will, by faith, lead us to Easter.

I was praying to St John Paul II for a better understanding of such suffering, and miraculously, a letter arrived from Fr Naden which carried Bishop Soter’s imprinted card with the image of St John Paul II. I really want to share it with you, you who are truly the brave warriors fighting against cancer.

Desmond Yong
Shah Alam