Thoughts on humility

Something I enjoy doing when I have the chance is interviewing people who are beginning (or continuing) the process of discerning their charisms. I get to hear all sorts of wonderful stories about how God works through ordinary people.

I had an interview this afternoon with a lovely woman who has actively served God and His Church for many years in a variety of capacities. An issue came up in the course of our conversation that I have encountered many times in the 200-plus times I’ve done this.

Often folks are reluctant to acknowledge fully the worth of things they do. They minimize, or even barely recognize, the effects of their efforts – even though those effects may be very clear to me, an outside observer “listening in” on a slice of their life. They don’t want to brag or imply that there is anything extraordinary about themselves. But this reluctance can be an obstacle to discernment.

To discern our gifts, we have to be able to look reality in the eye – which involves seeing and acknowledging what happens (or doesn’t happen) when we act. Humility is not thinking of ourselves or our efforts as worthless; it is seeing ourselves truly. Warts, virtues, deficits and gifts together. Erring on either side – either under- or over-estimating ourselves – is a failure of humility. Failing to acknowledge what God does through us can be both a stumbling block in the discernment process and a sort of inside-out pride, cheating God of His due.

This Lent, I ask God for a big dose of true humility – and the repentance that should also come with that.

Of course, my first instinct after typing that is to brace myself, or DUCK – who knows what God will consider it necessary to hit me with to drive that lesson home! :) But bring it on, Lord; You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Lead me home to the Father.