Breaking the Word

Sunday, August 29, 2010

22^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

Oh Lord It’s Hard to Be Humble…

Readings: Sirach 3:17-18, 20, 28-29; Psalm 68:4-5, 6-7, 10-11; Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24a; Luke 14:1, 7-14

Dear sisters and brothers, as sometimes happens, our readings today remind me of a song. It’s an old country number by Mac Davis. And the chorus goes like this:

Oh Lord it’s hard to be humble when you’re perfect in every way. I can’t wait to look in the mirror ‘cause I get better looking each day. To know me is to love me. I must be a hell of a man. Oh Lord it’s hard to be humble but I’m doing the best that I can.

Don’t be mistaken, sisters and brothers. Of course I know that I’m far from perfect in every way. And I’m definitely not getting better looking each day. But, even with all my flaws, I have to agree with Mac Davis that it is truly hard to be humble. Don’t you think so?

For one thing, it’s difficult to know what exactly it means to be humble. What at first looks like humility can often turn out to be something very different. For example, if I am unable to accept a genuine compliment because I don’t think very highly of myself, that’s not humility. It’s just low self-esteem. And neither is it true humility either, if I criticize myself on purpose, just so I can hear others disagree and tell me how wonderful I am. Humility is not a hook that I can use to fish for flattery. Humility is not about falsehood. It’s about the truth.

Even so, our readings remind us that humility has to do with lowering ourselves in some way. Humility involves lowering ourselves by first recognizing that all the good things in our lives are blessings from a generous and loving God. As the first reading reminds us: humble yourselves the more, the greater you are, and you will find favor with God. And not only does humility involve lowering ourselves before God, it also involves lowering ourselves before others. As Jesus tells his listeners in the gospel today, to be humble means to be willing to take the lowest place. And this is far from an easy thing to do, especially today, when it often seems that our very survival depends on our being able and willing to fight tooth and nail for the highest places. And what does it mean for me to take the lowest place if I am already unemployed, with a family to feed? Does it mean that I should somehow do less than my best to secure a job?

Which leads us to a second reason why I think it’s hard to be humble. It’s hard not just to know what humility is. It’s also hard to figure out when exactly to be humble. It’s difficult to know when we should lower ourselves before others. Consider, for example, what Jesus does in the gospel. Notice how several verses are missing from our reading, which jumps from verse 1 to verse 7. In verses 2 to 6, a man appears who has a sickness called dropsy. And Jesus challenges those with him at table: Should he heal this man even though it is a Sabbath day? Everybody keeps silent, probably because they think that it is unlawful to do so. Still, Jesus heals the man and sends him on his way. Was Jesus being humble? Was he lowering himself? Not before the Pharisees he wasn’t. But Jesus stood up to the Pharisees only so that he could lower himself before the one who needed healing. He challenged the first in order to show compassion to the second. And by doing this, Jesus teaches us that there is a right time and a wrong time to lower ourselves. The difficulty lies in distinguishing one from the other.

And, in order to do this, in order to know when is the right time to lower ourselves, it is important for us to face a third difficulty. Not only must we consider what humility means and when we should be humble, we also have to ask ourselves why we need to be humble. Why should we even bother to lower ourselves before others? Why not just rush for the highest places like everybody else?

It may at first appear that our readings are proposing a purely practical answer to this question. Why should we lower ourselves before God? According to the first reading, it is so that God will show us favor. And why should we take the lowest place before people? According to the gospel parable, it appears that it is only so that we can then be raised to the place of honor. But is this true humility? Or does it not resemble the kind of tactic used by the person who criticizes himself in order to fish for compliments from others? Consider also what Jesus tells us in the second half of today’s gospel. When we hold a lunch or dinner, we are to invite those who cannot invite us back – the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind? Why? According to Jesus, we will be repaid at the resurrection. But is this the only reason why we should invite all these people? Just so that we can be repaid? Is there no other reason to be humble, no other reason to lower ourselves?

Our readings contain a deeper reason. Notice, for example, what we heard in our second reading. Here, the writer invites us to compare two different appearances of God. The first is God’s appearance to the Israelites on Mount Sinai. The second is to us on Mount Zion. In both cases God lowers God’s self in order to show mercy to the people. But notice how the second lowering far exceeds the first. In the first, God spoke in a voice that still frightened the people, such that they begged that no message be further addressed to them. Then, in the second, God speaks in a different, far more accessible, far more approachable voice. God addresses us in the blood of Christ the Son, which speaks more eloquently even than the blood of Abel. This is the same blood of which we will partake at this Eucharist, the blood that sings of a love more powerful even than death. What then do we find here in this reading, sisters and brothers, if not a moving description of a humble God? One who is willing to lower God’s self even to the extent of shedding blood upon a Cross. And the reason why God does this is to raise us up. In the words of the response to the psalm: by lowering God’s self, God has made a home for the poor. Here, sisters and brothers, we find the deeper answer to our question. Why should we be humble? Why should we lower ourselves? We do so for no reason other than that this is what our God has done and continues to do for us. Like children who love nothing better than to imitate their parents, we are called to humility because we are sons and daughters of a humble God.

Sisters and brothers, it is indeed hard to be humble. But are we truly doing the best that we can?

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Breaking News: Ordinary Time

Apart from those seasons having their own distinctive character, thirty-three or thirty-four weeks remain in the yearly cycle that do not celebrate a specific aspect of the mystery of Christ. Rather, especially on the Sundays, they are devoted to the mystery of Christ in all its aspects. This period is known as Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time begins on Monday after the Sunday following 6 January and continues until Tuesday before Ash Wednesday inclusive. It begins again on Monday after Pentecost and ends before Evening Prayer I of the First Sunday of Advent. This is also the reason for the series of liturgical texts found in both the Roman Missal and The Liturgy of the Hours (Vol. III - IV), for Sundays and weekdays in this season. ~ General Norms for the Liturgical Year & Calendar, 43-44

From 36th Jesuit General Congregation

It is our union with one another in Christ that testifies to the Good News more powerfully than our competences and abilities.... In our individualistic and competitive age, we should remember that the community plays a very special role since it is a privileged place of apostolic discernment.... The Jesuit community is a concrete space in which we live as friends in the Lord. This life together is always at the service of mission, but because these fraternal bonds proclaim the Gospel, it is itself a mission. –Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice (CMRJ), nn. 7-9.

With the poor, we can learn what hope and courage mean.... In our communities and apostolates, we hear the call to rediscover hospitality to strangers, to the young, to the poor, and to those who are persecuted. Christ himself teaches us this hospitality. –CMRJ, nn. 15-16.

At the heart of Ignatian spirituality is the transforming encounter with the mercy of God in Christ that moves us to a generous personal response. The experience of the merciful gaze of God on our weakness and sinfulness humbles us and fills us with gratitude, helping us to become compassionate ministers to all.... For us Jesuits, compassion is action, an action discerned together. Yet we know that there is no authentic familiarity with God if we do not allow ourselves to be moved to compassion and action by an encounter with the Christ who is revealed in the suffering, vulnerable faces of people, indeed in the suffering of creation. –CMRJ, nn. 19-20.

(T)he Society must respond more decisively to the Church’s call for a new evangelization, giving special emphasis to ministry to and with the young and with families.... A special gift Jesuits and the Ignatian family have to offer to the Church and her mission of evangelization is Ignatian spirituality, which facilitates the experience of God and can therefore greatly help the process of personal and communal conversion. –CMRJ, nn. 22-23.

In many societies, there is an increased level of conflict and polarization, which often gives rise to violence that is all the more appalling because it is motivated and justified by distorted religious convictions. In such situations, Jesuits, along with all who seek the common good, are called to contribute from their religious-spiritual traditions towards the building of peace, on local and global levels. –CMRJ, n. 28.

Pope Francis has emphasized the fundamental connection between the environmental crisis and the social crisis in which we live today. Poverty, social exclusion, and marginalization are linked with environmental degradation. These are not separate crises but one crisis that is a symptom of something much deeper: the flawed way societies and economies are organised. The current economic system with its predatory orientation discards natural resources as well as people. For this reason, Pope Francis insists that the only adequate solution must be a radical one. The direction of development must be altered if it is to be sustainable. We Jesuits are called to help heal a broken world, promoting a new way of producing and consuming, which puts God’s creation at the center.... The multifaceted challenge of caring for our common home calls for a multifaceted response from the Society. We begin by changing our personal and community lifestyles, adopting behaviour coherent with our desire for reconciliation with creation. – CMRJ, nn. 29-30

From 35th Jesuit General Congregation

From General Congregation 35

By sending us to 'those physical and spiritual places which others do not or have difficulty reaching,' the Pope entrusts to us the task to 'build bridges of understanding and dialogue,' according to the best tradition of the Society, in the diversity of its ministries.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 6

To be missioned to this work 'at the New Frontiers of our times' always requires that one also be rooted at the very heart of the Church. This tension, specific to the Ignatian charism, opens the way to true creative fidelity.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 13

In every mission that we carry out, we seek only to be where (Christ) sends us. The grace we receive as Jesuits is to be and to go with him, looking on the world with his eyes, loving it with his heart and entering into its depths with his unending compassion.
- Decree on Identity, n. 15

For ultimately, there is no reality that is only profane for those who know how to look. We must communicate this look and provide a pedagogy inspired by the Spiritual Exercises, that carries people - especially the young - into it.
- Decree on Identity, n. 10

Our ministries of proclamation of the Word and the celebration of the Life of Christ in the sacraments continue to be fundamental for our mission and our lives together as Jesuits.
- Decree on Mission, n. 19

The complexity of the problems we face and the richness of the opportunities offered demand that we engage in building bridges between rich and poor and establishing advocacy links of mutual support between those who hold political power and those who find it difficult to voice their interests. Our intellectual apostolate provides an inestimable help in setting up these bridges, offering us new ways of understanding in depth the mechanism and links among our present problems.
- Decree on Mission, n. 28

Jesuit community is not just for mission, it is itself mission.
- Decree on Mission, n. 41

In this global context it is important to highlight the extraordinary potential represented by our character as an international and multicultural body. Acting consistently with this character can not only enhance the apostolic effectiveness of our work but in a fragmented and divided world it can witness to the reconciliation in solidarity of all the children of God.
- Decree on Mission, n. 43

Faith in Jesus Christ teaches us that self-realization comes from self-giving and that freedom is not so much the power to choose as the power to order our choices toward love. At the same time, love for Jesus Christ and the desire to follow him call us to trusting commitment. Commitment to the Word Incarnate cannot be separated from commitment to the concrete manifestations of the Word that are at the center of our lives, the Church and the Society which exists to serve the Church.
- Decree on Obedience, n. 19

Sunday, August 29, 2010

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