Fr. Joseph Tetlow, SJ, one of the gurus of Ignatian spirituality, points out that in our present environment, where premium is given to self-realization as a standard of well-being, the concept of humility as self-abasement does not appeal much.
Echoing St. Teresa of Avila’s “humility is truth,” Fr. Tetlow writes, “If you cling to a negative self-image and have no great respect for your gifts, you are not being humble. You are showing no gratitude to God, who gave you the gifts, and this sin of ingratitude provides the deepest wellspring of every other sin.”
This Sunday, we are given very vivid images of humility which can be easily misconstrued as self-abasement. The central image of a banquet is used in the two examples: not taking the place of honor lest one is “demoted,” and inviting the poor and marginalized who could not return the favor.
Two points to eliminate what humility is not, before we go to our main point for reflection.
First, humility certainly isn’t false modesty. Our novice master, Fr. Mat Sanchez, SJ, called this “huwag-na-pa,” on the surface feigning modesty by refusing acknowledgement and praise, but deep down, craving for the limelight and adulation.
Using the Gospel image, this is a person who will sit in a humble place in the banquet, with the hope that he will be noticed and promoted to the place of honor.
Second, humility is not just living simply or poorly, ridding oneself of all the worldly trappings, but deep down driven by pride and ego. These are the ones we often call people so full of themselves, but those who live simply or poorly externally are far more insidious than those who are flamboyantly self-centered. The former are often narcissists.
Fodder for egos
In the Gospel example, these are the people who use the poor and the marginalized, even championing their cause, as fodder for their egos, but in the end it is about them and not the poor and the marginalized.
In St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises, the goal is to attain spiritual freedom with gratitude as one of its core virtues that leads to magnanimous self-giving—a giving back to God—in love and service.
This is the context of Tetlow’s gratitude for God’s gifts as true humility and ingratitude as the root of all other sins; thus, ingratitude as pride, perhaps even more sinful than pride since it involves an awareness of God’s gracious and magnanimous love, yet choosing not to be grateful.
Perhaps we have often taken the wrong path to or held a wrong view of humility as self-abasement and false modesty on the one hand, the fruit of the struggle with self-centeredness and narcissism, or as insecurity and low self-esteem on the other hand, inflicted by others or our life’s circumstances.
Either way, these paths or views do not lead to spiritual freedom, but to bondage.
Ignatius’ process is our process of deepening our relationship with Christ by knowing him more, loving him more and following him more. This is the process of humility and the process of spiritual freedom.
St. Paul writes, “and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3: 17-19)
Knowing Christ, deepening and making our relationship with him more personal leads to loving him more, and loving him more is expressed in following him more.
This process requires the capacity for self-awareness, and the humility comes with self-acceptance—awareness of one’s gifts and blessedness as well as one’s shortcomings, brokenness and sinfulness.
The acceptance of all this leads to the first level of freedom, the freedom from an inordinate attachment to our gifts and blessings that leads to pride, and the freedom from an inordinate attachment to our failures and sinfulness that leads to insecurity.