More Humility

Today, we hear both in Sirach (3:17-18) and from Jesus (Lk 17:7-14) that humility is a good thing – even a necessary thing to live a holy life – yet who wants to be humble?  As a young boy, I had major issues with humility.  I was, and Mary would say that I still am, intensely competitive.  I had to win.  I had to be right.

My mom always cringed when my cousin, Jimmy, and I got together and pulled out a board game.  She claimed both of us were really ugly losers.  I don’t know about Jimmy, but she was probably right about me.  Today, Mary says the only time she hears me shout in anger is when I’m watching the Yankees or Notre Dame on TV and things aren’t going too well.

Incredibly enough, as a six or seven-year old, though I didn’t tell anyone the results, I kept track of my win-loss record in games I played with other people – including games of Old Maid I played with my elderly grandmother.  I was undefeated against Grandma – but it probably would have taken some of the glory out it if I had known that she was letting me win every game.

I hated the expression, “you can’t win them all.”  I had to grudgingly admit that it was true – except for Old Maid with Grandma – but you could still try to win every game, every encounter, and everything, for wasn’t all of life a game of sorts?  Wasn’t it virtuous to strive to be the fastest, the smartest, the rightest and the best?

I associated being humble with being a loser.   Losing was more than a disappointment, it was, like the man asked to step lower in today’s story, embarrassing and humiliating.  What fun is that? 

And as parents, don’t we want to teach our children to stand up for their rights?  Who wants to see people take advantage of our children, to see others step all over them?  That’s not right, is it?  And isn’t that what humility will get them, the short end of the stick?

Upon reflection, humility was not my problem; it was simply my idea of humility that caused me grief.  More importantly, my concept of being “exalted” – having people think I was a winner, someone of great esteem – was way too limited, just as it was for the hosts at the dinner where Jesus finds himself.

Note that in the seating strategy at the feast, the game is for a fixed amount of honor.  There is only one seat of honor, and if you get it, someone else doesn’t.  And if someone else gets it, you don’t.  When my thinking is along those lines, I gain immense pleasure from “winning the game.”  Jesus doesn’t give us the details, but you can imagine the smirk on the face of the guest in the lower seat as he is invited higher.  Or imagine the self-satisfied look on the face of the newly-arrived honored guest as he bumps someone down the table.  That pleasure I sense when I achieve honor or esteem relative to those around me has a name.  It is pride.  And one consequence of pride is the destruction of relationships.  After all, how can I show the love that Jesus demands if I am in desperate competition for the seat of honor?

And here is where Christian humility becomes so necessary.  For Christian humility is grounded not in the fixed, finite honor available from the people around us, but is based on the infinite love of God, the one who created me, the one who loves me despite all my failings, despite being so far beyond my understanding, even despite my efforts to ignore Him and the gift he offers me.

Humility is recognizing that God has showered this love on each and every one of his creatures, as only one with infinite and unconditional love can do.  It matters not if I am winning or losing, or if I am right or wrong, or if people honor or despise me.  God continues to love me in the same way, as he continues to love you, and as he continues to love every human who has ever lived, who lives, and who will ever live.

Only when I get this can I understand the paradox that Jesus teaches – if I am humble, I cannot be humiliated.  If I am humble, I am pleased, not indignant, with the success of others, knowing that God desires good for all of his creatures, and the other’s good in no way detracts from the good that I have received, namely the infinite and unconditional love of God.  If I am humble, I can eagerly and generously share with others the love which God gives me, knowing that I have already been paid in kind, and will be continue to be loved more than I can imagine, even beyond the end of time itself.

Only with humility can our relationship with God, can our relationships with each other, be complete.  Only in humility can we be truly exalted.