Wednesday, August 12, 2020 –
There is a sad trend that has been happening over the last…oh…55 years. We have seen a stark decline in basic Catholic knowledge, and I mean BASIC! This, coupled with the meme / cancel culture we have today, has made for some serious cringe-worthy moments. Seriously! My head is in constant pain from repeated facepalms.
In order to rectify a small part of this, perhaps we should spend the next few days discussing some basic (I…mean…BASIC!!) Catholic definitions. Let’s start with humility…
What is humility?
Good news, everybody! Humility has its own entry in the glossary at the back of the Catechism. Woot!
Humility: The virtue by which a Christian acknowledges that God is the author of all good. Humility avoids inordinate ambition or pride, and provides the foundation for turning to God in prayer (2559). Voluntary humility can be described as “poverty of spirit” (2546).
Breaking this down, humility is recognizing that God is in charge, not us!
To dig a little deeper, we will use one of my favorite Catholic resources, My Catholic Faith: A Catechism in Pictures (noted as MCF below) by the Most Reverend Louis LaRavoire Morrow, S.T.D., a truly wonderful book from 1954. And really, who doesn’t love to learn with pictures!?
Humility is opposed to pride. “Pride is an inordinate love of one’s own excellence, an excessive self-esteem” (MCF, 25). Bishop Morrow goes on to explain that “[t]he proud man overestimates himself and believes himself the source of his own excellence. The virtue of humility, which disposes us to acknowledge our limitations, is opposed to pride” (MCF, 25.1)
To depend solely on ourselves and give ourselves the unjust credit for everything in our lives is pride. But let’s jump forward into MCF, section 44 and see what Bishop Morrow specifically says about humility:
What is humility? –Humility is that moral virtue which disposes us to appreciate and acknowledge our true position with respect to God and our fellowmen…
1. The humble man acknowledges God as the source of all the excellent things he may possess. He recognizes his limitations, his own nothingness, and the uselessness of all earthly things without God…
2. The humble man knows that earthly things are of value only if they lead us to God. His detachment from all things worldly frees him from all human fear…
3. The humble man has his best model in the Son of God Himself, Jesus Christ, Who humbled Himself out of love for men…
4. Our Lord continually urged us to humility; as when He said, “He who is greatest among you shall be your servant” (Matt. 23:11)…
5. Humility is opposed both to pride and to excessive and affected self-abjection…
Humility is then recognizing that God is in charge, not us! It is acknowledging that God is the source of all goodness and good things in our life and seeing that we are nothing without Him.
So, when you see a meme that says…
“I wear my face covering while in public for HUMILITY: I may have COVID. People can spread the disease before they have symptoms.”
…know that this statement is grossly false in definition AND scope.
Remember, humility means God is in charge, not us! It is about us recognizing our relation to God and recognizing that an inordinate love of self (ahem…pride) is opposed to humility because it overestimates oneself as the source of excellence and good things in your life.
For the record, humility has absolutely zero to do with whether or not you may or may not have a virus because it is about our relation to God.
But what about relation to our fellow man? Isn’t putting someone else above us humility? Or putting their needs before ours?
Um…no. Humility isn’t about our wants or needs, nor is about someone else’s wants or needs. Remember, humility is acknowledging “our true position with respect to God and our fellowmen” (MCF, 44) It **is** about our relation to God and others. God is our Creator. Our fellow men, like us, are God’s creations, made in the image and likeness of God. Humility is our recognition and appreciation of our relation to God and our fellow men.
However, putting someone else’ needs before your own is indeed selfless (assuming that it does not harm you in the process). Being selfless leads building virtue. Virtue is “a habitual and firm disposition to do the good” (CCC, glossary). “The virtuous person tends toward the good with all his sensory and spiritual powers; he pursues the good and chooses it in concrete actions. The goal of a virtuous life is to become like God” (CCC, 1803). Habitual selfless behavior and acts recognizes the greatness of God and seeks to thank Him for the good and seek forgiveness for our faults. The recognition of God’s almighty power and our relation to it—from Him all things flow—is humility.
So, while putting someone else’s needs above our own is selfless, it is not humility.
But what about sin and bad things and stuff? Doesn’t God want us to do everything to stop it?
Well, you are getting into some Summa-level theology there about the Active and Passive Will of God, but all right, I’ll bite! This is definitely fodder for its own series of posts, but here are the basics:
God’s Active Will (sometimes listed as Antecedent or Positive) is basically what God desires in the world devoid of our screwing up. (Again, we’re talking SUPER BASIC here). Example: God is infinitely good and wills only that which is good, like creation and all men be saved.
God’s Passive Will (sometimes listed as Consequent) is basically what happens in the world and what we do to screw up. Example: God is infinitely good and gave us free will. However, sometimes typhoons or viruses happen, and sometimes we routinely use our free will to make bad choices or do bad things. God did NOT will the bad but allows it (many times to His own benefit, despite how hard we work to thwart Him).
So, yes, God would like us to choose good, and choosing good leads to virtue and yada-yada (scroll up a couple paragraphs).
So what is humility? It is recognizing that God is in charge, not us!
Heart of Jesus, patient and most merciful, have mercy on us.
