Bible
Study: Sirach 3, 17 to 29. Hebrews 12, 18 to 24 and Luke 14, 7 to 14.
Everything
about today’s liturgy is on Humility. If I was to ask, how many of us here are
proud, I doubt if anyone would raise his or her hand. No matter how we are, we
always like to think of ourselves as humble. It takes another person to tell
whether or not you are humble. Humility is like your face. You cannot see how
your face looks like without a mirror and you cannot assume that the way you
were looking yesterday is still the way you look today. That is why we look at
the mirror again and again. When it comes to humility, we need people to constantly
tell us how we are and just as we do not argue with the mirror, we cannot
afford to disagree when people tell us we are proud. One of the characteristics
of really proud persons is to disagree when others tell them they are proud.
There are
two dimensions to humility; God-centred humility and People-Centred humility. Our
opening prayer at this mass acknowledges the God-centred humility when in it we
prayed: “God of might, giver of every good gift… deepen our sense of reverence…”
God alone is Almighty and He is the Source of everything that we consider good.
Humility before God is to have a deep sense of reverence. It is seeing oneself
as nothing before God. God-centred humility underlies our devotion and worship.
It affects how much fear or disrespect so to say, we show towards God and his commandments.
That we are not able to obey God’s commandments is a sure proof that we do not
respect him enough.
God-centred
humility also reflects on how we treat the House of God. If during the mass, we
are busy fondling with our phones, browsing internet, chatting on whatsapp or Facebook,
viewing pictures on Instagram, watching movies or playing games, it simply
shows we have no reverence for God. Even the way we dress to church, the way we
move about, the way we comport ourselves or the kind of thoughts we allow to
occupy our minds shows our level of respect for God. When we begin to make noise
and run commentaries as if we are in a market place, when during consecration,
you find it so difficult to just kneel down and focus, when we “blow guy” to
the Altar to receive Holy Communion instead of folding our hands and do things
to draw attention unto ourselves, we are showing lack of respect for God. Our second
reading today tells us where we are: “Mount Zion, the city of the living God.”
This is why we must respect this Church.
Again, our
ability to acknowledge God as the source of our talents, our riches and in fact,
everything we own is a pointer to our level of humility. When we begin to carry
ourselves like gods and behave as if we deserve more honour than other persons,
when we fail to acknowledge we are nothing without God, when we aspire for
honour and self-glorification like the men whom Jesus addresses in today’s
Gospel passage, we should know pride has taken the better part of us.
According
to Fr. Idahosa Amadusu in his homily for this Sunday: “Ever since the sin of
Adam of Eve, who sinned because they wanted to be like God (Gen. 3:5), we have
been afflicted with the tendency to want to be in the limelight. Just as God is
the centre of the universe we also want to be centre of everyone's attention or
at least be in the good book or high opinion of others. Rather than looking up
to God and wanting to please him, we often want to have the honour and
attention of the world.” Being humble towards God requires that we do
everything in our power to give God his due; that we do not take the glory that
rightfully belongs to him; that we ensure He alone receives praise and
attention always.
The second
dimension of humility is the People-centred humility. This is reflected in how
we treat our fellow human beings. What yardstick do we use in giving respect to
people? Do we make people feel as though they are nothing when they are around
us? Humility requires that we treat people with respect regardless of their
social status, wealth, education, or whatever be our criteria of judgement. Humility
is a deliberate effort on our part to regard and relate with all human beings
as equals not minding how highly we placed we consider ourselves to be. It is
in fact, a refusal to look down on another human person; treating each person as
if he or she is better than you are.
In Philippians
2, 3 to 8, we read: “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but IN
HUMILITY REGARD OTHERS AS BETTER THAN YOURSELVES. Let each of you look not to
your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you
that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard
equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the
form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he
humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death-- even death on a
cross.” Humility is knowing who and what I am but refusing to allow this
knowledge affect the way I treat people. Jesus Christ knew fully well he is
God, yet see how he related with people. When it comes to humility, Christ is
our greatest model. Humility is forgetting yourself, putting aside your
personal interests and putting the interests of others ahead of yours, treating
people more importantly than yourself.
A humble person
never assumes he is better than anyone else. He never calls himself the
greatest. He takes the lowest seat hoping there are more important persons also
invited. A humble person does not compete with others, he does not do things to
give others the impression that he is also capable of doing what they do or
achieving what they have. We Nigerians are very competitive. There is a type of
generator we call “I better pass my neighbour.” Everything we do, even up to
living over and above our means, is coloured by the spirit of I-better-pass-my-neighbour.
When are we going to be healed of this disease? When are we going to start
accepting that my neighbour better pass me? In the spirit of competition lies a
very dangerous pride lurking within us, we compete to tell ourselves we are the
greatest, we are the best, no one should ever do more or have more than
ourselves. We become so ostentatious, we want to show, we want to prove, we
want others to bow down for us by force. So if my friend was driving a “palasa”
like my own before and suddenly he buys a “land cruiser”, me too, I must get a
bigger one otherwise, I will not rest again. Who does he think he is? No way
oh!
Fr.
Amadusu throws further light when he said: “One way to grow and at the same
time test our level of humility is how we accept humiliations. As St. Josemaria
once said, humility is not simply when you humble yourself, but it is more so
when you are humbled and you accept it with equanimity. Beneath the difficulty
we often have in forgiving others is the lack of humility in not accepting the
humiliation their offences must have caused us. This lack of acceptance of
humiliation could be further traced back to the high opinion we have of
ourselves….”
“The last
part of the gospel links humility to selflessness. In this, our Lord says that
we should not only do good to those who can repay us back (Luke 14, 12 to 14).
Doing good, inviting people to share with them ordinarily ought to be an act of
charity and self-giving. But in it, we could find the temptation to do these
things only for the sake of the repayment or the appreciation we will get from
others. It is a matter of justice that we show appreciation to those who have
done good to us. But it becomes something else to want to do good ONLY for the
sake of seeking the appreciation of others or being repaid in kind….” So when
organizing your next party or event, consider inviting those who can never
repay you; the lame, the blind, the poor, the lepers, orphans, the less
privileged.
In
conclusion, Fr. Amadusu says: “Humility is often described as the mother of all
virtues. Others call it the container of all virtues. It is what gives shape to
other virtues. Hence we have to pray for it often.”
Let us
pray:
Jesus,
meek and humble of heart, make my heart like unto thine. May Mary our model of
humility assist us in constantly offering this aspiration to God. Amen.
Good morning.
Be Happy. Live Positive. Have Faith. It is well with you. God bless you.
Happy
Sunday.
Fr. Abu
