Tenth Sunday After Pentecost

Adam Paige
Aug 16
5 min read

Updated: Aug 18

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost. What is Humility ?

The Gospel according to St. Luke, xviii. 9-14.

“At that time, Jesus spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves as just and despised others: Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in the week; I give tithes of all that I possess. And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven, but struck his breast, saying: O God, be merciful to me a sinner. I say to you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: because every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”

Summary of the Morrow’s Meditation

After having gone through all the actions which belong to a Christian life, we will meditate henceforth upon the virtues which constitute this life. We will begin with humility, of which the gospel of the day makes so magnificent an eulogium, and which may be called the first of the virtues, because it is the foundation of them all. We shall see in our meditation: 1st, what must be understood by humility; 2d, how reasonable, thus understood, is humility. We will then make the resolution: 1st, to make humility our virtue of predilection and to ask it earnestly of God; 2d, not to allow a single day to pass without performing some interior or exterior act of humility. Our spiritual nosegay shall be the words of the Holy Ghost: “Humble thyself in all things and thou shalt find grace before God” (Ecclus. iii. 10).

Meditation for the Morning

Let us adore the Son of God descending from heaven to earth to teach us humility by means of His heavenly doctrine, and still more by His example, since the whole of His life, from Bethlehem to Calvary, was nothing but a continual lesson of humility. Let us confess that as His eternal majesty was continually humiliated, it would be intolerable behavior on our part to be puffed up with pride and vanity. Let us render all our homage to this humbled God.

What we must Understand by Humility.

Humility consists in despising ourselves, because we see that we are supremely contemptible, and to feel it to be only right that others should despise us, because it is right that what is contemptible should be despised. It does not consist, therefore, either in humble words which are contrary to our thoughts, or in a modest exterior hiding a soul which esteems itself and endeavors to obtain the esteem of others. Humility is the frankness of an upright soul which desires only that which it knows to be true, which wills and loves what is true, even when what is true humiliates and confounds it. It says to itself: I have nothing in myself which belongs to me; my mind, God has made it and can withdraw it from me at any moment; a slight derangement of the brain is sufficient to make the greatest intellect lose all its genius, and the wisest all his knowledge, and even his reason. I have no virtue in myself; if there be any in me, it is the doing of grace, and the slightest temptation can overthrow it. Even my body does not belong to me; God has made it such as it is, He has lent it to me, and the slightest accident can change its form or its beauty. To this nothingness of the whole of my being I have added sin, which has rendered me worthy of the eternal contempt of the whole of hell. And as the sum-total of all my miseries, I am incapable of all good, even of one single thought or word, which might be of use for my salvation; capable of all kinds of evil, since there is not, says St. Augustine, any sin committed by a man of which another man would not be capable if the grace of God did not hold him back. Now in such conditions as these I can neither esteem myself nor desire to be esteemed, without being guilty of injustice and falsehood; I ought to despise myself, to love contempt, obscurity, and humiliation, through love of truth, which cries to me from out of the bottom of my conscience that such is the portion of nothingness and of sin. I ought, consequently, to put away from me all thoughts imbued with pride, self-love, ambition, pretension, and susceptibility. I ought to be content to be nothing, and to be looked upon as nothing. Is it thus that I have hitherto understood humility ?

Humility Rightly Understood is Eminently Reasonable.

For what is more reasonable than to keep to what is true ? and is there not disloyalty in lying to ourselves, in not allowing ourselves to be looked upon as what we are, because it is displeasing to us, as if it could be changed on account of our not confessing it ? God, the Author of all good, has sown the good grain in the field of our soul; we, who alone are authors of all that is evil, have sown in it tares; is it seemly for us to glorify ourselves and say: This harvest is my work? What more reasonable, also, when we know the root of an evil, than to tear out the root? Now, the bad passions which are in us — pride, ambition, vanity, the love of riches, and other attachments which make us commit so many sins, which render us so unhappy because of the deceptions they inflict upon us, have all of them the common root, which is self-esteem together with the desire to be esteemed; and this root humility destroys. Lastly, what more reasonable than to lean upon an immovable pillar, rather than upon a reed which bends ? Now, this is what the humble man does. Being aware of his weakness, he does not lean upon himself, and he does not expose himself to temptation; he counts only upon God, who has promised him His help, and he confides in Him alone, becoming thereby strong with the strength of God Himself, so that he is able to say with the Apostle: “I can do all things in Him who strengthened me” (Philipp. iv. 13). “When I am weak, then am I powerful” (II. Cor. xii. 10). The proud man dare not undertake any thing; and, if he undertake it, he is troubled and annoyed in executing it; the least difficulty discourages him: his self-love fears humiliation and failure. The humble man, on the contrary, after having taken counsel of prudence, goes forward with his eyes fixed upon God, in whom he places all his confidence (Ps. xvii. 30). He goes forward leaning on the pillar, which is God, not upon the reed of human misery, and is thereby capable of great things. Let us ask of God this treasure of humility, which is the foundation of wisdom, reason, and good sense.

Resolutions and spiritual nosegay as above.

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