"Suffering, then, is the badge of true discipleship.  The disciple is not above his master. Following Christ means _passio passiva_, suffering because we have to suffer. That is why Luther reckoned suffering among the marks of the true Church, and one of the memoranda drawn up in preparation for the Augsburg Confession similarly defines the Church as the community of those 'who are persecuted and martyred for the gospel's sake.' If we refuse to take up our cross and submit to suffering and rejection at the hands of men, we forfeit our fellowship with Christ and have ceased to follow him. But if we lose our lives in his service and carry our cross, we shall find our lives again in the fellowship of the cross with Christ. The opposite of discipleship is to be ashamed of Christ and his cross and all the offence which the cross brings in its train." -- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, _The Cost of Discipleship_, p 100-101.

Isn't suffering though overrated??  Thought:  There is suffering and then there is suffering.  Avoiding suffering seems to be a sane thing to do.  At least avoiding stress that bleeds over into distress.  Christ is supposed to have died for our sins.  Then does that mean we have to die for others' sins?  Follow Christ's example?

It just seems too much to ask!  I suffer from depression.  Nothing really brings it on other than self-persecution allied with perhaps faulty wiring in the brain which is helped by pharmaceuticals.  We can be our own worst enemy.  But we can also take the call and love ourselves in the process of trying to love other people.  And one cannot truly love other people unless one respects and loves oneself in the first place, at least, so I am told.

And love should be easy, not hard!  Love should be lovely and cool and wonderful and freeing and and and....

So why does religion have to make it so hard??