“To the woman also he said: ‘I will multiply thy sorrows, and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee.’ And to Adam he said: ‘Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work; with labour and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life. Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return.’”
God does not curse Adam and Eve. He is far too gentle for that. Rather, he sees their present pitiable state of sin, and begins to set the remedy. Suffering becomes the consequence of sin, with the pains of childbirth and the necessity of labor for one’s family putting a sort of cloud upon the pleasures of the flesh. Nature begins to turn against man, labor becomes hard, the earth becomes barren. While this, to the sinful person, can serve as a reminder of sin: “For the wicked that denied to know thee, were scourged by the strength of thy arm, being persecuted by strange waters, and hail, and rain, and consumed by fire” (Wisdom 16:16), the primary purpose of the punishment of suffering is to make you realize that there is more to life than just this world. Every joy in this life has a counterweight to it: “All things are hard: man cannot explain them by word” (Ecclesiastes 1:8). Trials, sorrows, and difficulties fall upon all, both the just and the unjust, that the sinful man may know that there is more to life than this present one, opportunities for virtue and the exercise of the love of neighbor may come about, and Jesus, by His Cross, has made suffering itself become an act of love. The pains of childbirth symbolize this in a particular way, showing that the grave trials that one endures will end with the joy of love: “When the Lord brought back the captivity of Sion, we became like men comforted. Then was our mouth filled with gladness, and our tongue with joy” (Psalm 125:1-2). Your home is heaven, your love is Christ, for He is the only one that can give you perfect love: “As apple tree among the trees of the woods, so is my beloved among the sons” (Song 2:3). If you look to be loved in the exact way that you need by others, you will walk away empty, for all the justice actions of man carry with them something tainted due to his fallen nature. No, your duty is not to be loved but to love, and in bringing forth spiritual children in this manner, you will encounter the labor pains here mentioned. You, as a bride of Christ, are to be subject to your Divine Head, obeying Him with a loving heart, knowing that His love is poured out upon you as you heed Him: “If you shall keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love; as I also have kept my Father’s commandments, and do abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be filled” (John 15:10-11). His commands are extreme to one that possesses a cold heart, working for himself, but to the selfless, loving heart, they are chains of gold: “For in [wisdom] is the beauty of life, and her bands are a healthful binding. Thou shalt put her on as a robe of glory, and thou shalt set her upon thee as a crown of joy” (Ecclesiasticus 6:31-32); “We will make thee chains of gold, inlaid with silver” (Song 1:10). The sentence upon Adam, that his labor which was previously prescribed is now toilsome and oftentimes useless, is also meant to lead you to heavenly things. Your work will not remain, it passes quickly with time; “There is no remembrance of former things: nor indeed of those things which hereafter are to come, shall there be any remembrance with them that shall be in the latter end” (Ecclesiastes 1:11). Much of it will be pointless, even spiritual work falls on deaf ears: “Speak not in the ears of fools: because they will despise the instruction of thy speech” (Proverbs 23:9), with much time spent bearing little fruit. This is to keep you detached from your work, that you may do what you have a mind to do with a joyful, loving heart: “And I have found that nothing is better than for a man to rejoice in his work, and that this is his portion” (Ecclesiastes 3:22). It is not in the work that you do but the love with which you do it, applying your heart to your every action and filling it with love. For when you return to earth, you will be judged solely on the love with which you lived, not on your accomplishments, your learning, your perceived spiritual fruit, the number of prayers you did, or the arguments you won. All things fade as a result of sin, nothing in life is perfect. Instead, exchange your heart for the Sacred Heart: “My son, give my thy heart,” that you may instead burn with the fire of Jesus’ Heart, and “let thy eyes keep my ways” (Proverbs 23:26) that you may always do what is pleasing to Him. This is to live on love, and to live as man was originally intended to live.