Finding Purpose in Suffering
The Viktor Frankl Story
Viktor Frankl was a Jewish psychiatrist imprisoned at Auschwitz who later converted
to Catholicism. He said in his classic book, "Man’s Search for Meaning", that we could survive any
“how” as long as we knew the “why”. That is, if we could somehow find meaning in our suffering, we could draw
strength from it to continue on and survive.
Nazi Prisoners
Photographer: Unknown2
Frankl had every intention of surviving and helping the other survivors when the time
came. Finding purpose in his captivity got him through.
There is purpose in our suffering. Though we may seem lost at times, finding value in
our suffering restores hope. Finding meaning give purpose. And if we think of our suffering in those terms we can
see, this how Jesus endured the Cross.1
"…in one life there is love for one's children to tie to; in another life, a talent
to be used; in a third, perhaps only lingering memories worth preserving…
Frankl at Wobbelin
Photographer: Unknown4
Viktor Frankl
Photographer: Katharina Vesely1
The "whys" of many of the tragedies we face are a great mystery. In our pain
we called out asking "Why". After the initial shocks of Auschwitz, Frankl coped and ultimately survived
by finding purpose in his captivity. Using his psychological skills, he observed day to day life at Auschwitz.
He gathered research in his mind on how people cope with and endure such extreme evils.
Viktor Frankl at Auschwitz
Artist: Unknown3
As a long-time prisoner in bestial
concentration camps he [Viktor Frankl] found himself stripped to naked existence. His father, mother, brother,
and his wife died in camps or were sent to gas ovens, so that, excepting for his sister, his entire family perished
in these camps. How could he - every possession lost, every value destroyed, suffering from hunger, cold and
brutality, hourly expecting extermination - how could he find life worth preserving?"
Frankl identifies three psychological reactions experienced by all inmates to one degree
or another: (1) shock during the initial admission phase to the camp, (2) apathy after becoming accustomed to camp
existence, in which the inmate values only that which helps himself and his friends survive, and (3) reactions of
depersonalization, moral deformity, bitterness, and disillusionment if he survives and is liberated.
Frankl concludes that the meaning of life is found in every moment of living; life never
ceases to have meaning, even in suffering and death. In a group therapy session during a mass fast inflicted on the
camp's inmates trying to protect an anonymous fellow inmate from fatal retribution by authorities, Frankl offered
the thought that for everyone in a dire condition there is someone looking down, a friend, family member, or even
God, who would expect not to be disappointed. Frankl concludes from his experience that a prisoner's psychological
reactions are not solely the result of the conditions of his life, but also from the freedom of choice he always has
even in severe suffering.
… We stumbled on in the darkness, over big stones and through large puddles, along the
one road leading from the camp. The accompanying guards kept shouting at us and driving us with the butts of their
rifles. Anyone with very sore feet supported himself on his neighbor's arm. Hardly a word was spoken; the icy wind
did not encourage talk. Hiding his mouth behind his upturned collar, the man marching next to me whispered suddenly:
"If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don't know what is happening
to us."
That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping
on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we
both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and
the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife's
image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging
look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.
Concentration Camp Prisoners at Buchenwald
by Margaret Bourke-White5
A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into
song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth – that love is the ultimate and
the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and
human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man
who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his
beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only
achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way – an honorable way – in such a position man
can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time
in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of
an infinite glory…2
Freed Concentration Camp Prisoners
Artist: Margaret Bourke-White6
