TWENTY-SECOND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YR C
Sirach 3:17-18,20,28-29; Psalm 68;
Hebrews 12:18-19,22-24a; Luke 14:1,7-14.
HUMILITY OVER PRIDE
The readings today admonish us against Pride. It is a struggle that we all deal with but sometimes people make a joke out of it such that it no longer seems like a big deal.
All great spiritual fathers or mentors recognise pride as the one thing that can harm us the most. Pride is the highest and most deadly sin. It can affect us in almost every way. It can have negative effect on our personal growth, our relationship with family, friends and colleagues.
What is pride?
St Thomas Aquinas says, “it is the inordinate elf-love’. It means the only goal of pride is to trumpet one’s excellence above all others. Pride is such that it makes the individual overestimate his excellence and ability. One negates even the good that can come from others and is blind to his own limitations. Blinded to his own limitations or weaknesses and the good he can find in others; the proud man does not recognise the need for his dependence on God. Pride then affects ourselves, our relationship with others and above all our relationship with God.
The result is, all that the individual cares about is the self. This is what St Augustine noticed about the proud man. For him Pride is an orientation towards self-centeredness. He describes pride as “curvatus in se” (curved inward), to be caved in around oneself.
It is an attitude that prevents us from contact with reality because all we know and care about is ourselves. It is like living in a narrow world of our own. It is drawing everything into the self and the things that concern the self. Instead of going out to the world to encounter and appreciate others, the world is drawn to the little narrow space of self-preoccupation.
It expresses itself in always finding fault with others because no one is better enough except the self. The desire to be superior and be better than anyone else is a subtle temptation of pride. For this reason, the proud man is seen always criticizing others. There is one word, whose nuance depicts pride. The word is “self-aggrandizement”. A beautiful word but describes one who is just concerned about himself and his interests.
What is the Source of Pride?
Pride comes from our finiteness, the fear of insufficiency and because of this we seek to protect our space. Even though we are finite and have limit, our desires are wild. Being better than what we truly are, is the most burning yearning of pride. Behind all that is the fear of being discovered as weak and unable sometimes. But it is in this uncertainty and fear that our strength should be seen. Our strength does not lie absolutely in ourselves but in our connection with God, the world and others. And so there is an antidote to pride.
What is the Antidote to Pride?
Humility!! Humility is the antidote to pride. This is because it comes from the word “humus” which means soil or ground. To be humble then is to be grounded or be in touch with reality. It is the reality of the fact that “I am not alone”. I am with others who may be better or lesser than me.
We must recognise this is so because we must lean on one another. There is a certain natural rule of reciprocity. This is the truth we must come to realise. Psychologically, self-regard is equivalent to misery. This is because if we were true to ourselves, we would acknowledge that the best moments of our lives are when we forget about our inordinate self but open up to interact with others and serve them.
The Gospel advices us to be aware of the cunning temptation of pride. For this reason, we must make a conscious effort to take actions of humility. Pride is the burden of temptation we all carry but with the awareness of our dependence on God, and the recognition that others around us complete us and make life beautiful and graceful, we can overcome it. Rather than yielding to the instinct to have all things about us, let us resolve to be humble.
God bless you.
By Fr Delight Carbonu
