Thomas Griffin 9/29/25 (For The Daily Signal)
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I married Joanna on Sept. 14, 2019. In our short marriage, we have been blessed with three children (Benedict, Gabriel, and Abigail). We have experienced the peaks of our love in the joyful and simple moments of life. However, we have also experienced the paradox of love in the shadows of suffering.
Sept. 14 was also the Catholic feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. The celebration is meant to urge followers of Christ to cling to the crosses of their lives as a way to literally become like Jesus. As a lifelong Catholic and theology teacher, I have known this spiritual truth for years. It was only over the past month or so that I finally began to experience it in a concrete and transformative manner. It revolved around one specific event.
On Aug. 25, Joanna needed brain surgery. Over the summer, doctors discovered a cyst wrapped around her pituitary gland and optic nerve. It was giving her headaches, tingling, and eye pain. The night we were told about her condition has been ironed in my memory. She went to the emergency room with her mom, and I stayed home with the three kids. She called hours later and told me, crying, “They found something in my head, they found something … ”
Thomas Griffin is the chairperson of the religion department at a Catholic high school on Long Island where he lives with his wife and children. He has a masters degree in theology and is a masters candidate in philosophy. Thomas is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Empty Tomb Project: The Magazine. He is the author of Let Us Begin: Saint Francis’s Way of Becoming Like Christ and Renewing the World.
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