Today’s readings: Ecclesiasticus 3, 17-20.28-29; Hebrews 12, 18-19.22-24; Luke 14, 1. 7-14.
We often complain of a society that has become too competitive, where relationships are too calculating, and where many times our dealings with each other are governed too much by egoism and self-centredness.
These are traps we are all prone to fall into. Without even noticing it, we can easily end up perpetuating a culture we ourselves complain of. It is a culture of aloneness, where all that many care about is self-preservation or their own success.
Today’s Scriptures are eye-opening on this. Both Ecclesiasticus and St Luke’s gospel speak of humility as a basic attitude of the mind and the heart. Humility is hardly measurable, yet it can radically change our outlook on life, as well as the physiognomy of society in general. As we read from Ecclesiasticus: “There is no cure for the proud man’s malady”.
Humility is in no way synonymous with having low self-esteem. They are two totally different things. Neither is it self-abasement, which has nothing to do with Christian virtue.
In today’s gospel, Jesus is touching on the source of our true self. He is simply contesting the logic of self-inflated egos to help us restore true dignity in the way we perceive ourselves and in the way we relate to others. It is almost a call to reinvent new ways of being with others and for others, particularly those at the lowest scales of society.
Relationships have become too strained in a culture where everything has a price and where we are losing the meaning of simple gestures that used to be the spice of life and of how we dealt with each other.
The rule of competition that governs life from the first years of education onwards has brought us where we are. It has created a culture where nothing is wrong with ‘vainglory’ and with putting oneself excessively at the centre. This contrasts with the wise words from Ecclesiasticus: “Be gentle in carrying out your business. The greater you are, the more you should behave humbly.”
In Greek mythology, the problem of Narcissus was that, out of pride, he disdained those who loved him but he then fell in love with his own reflection in the pool, not realising it was merely an image. There is nothing wrong in loving oneself. The problem today’s gospel is highlighting is not strictly speaking love of self, but self-centeredness.
The letter to the Hebrews speaks about our experience of God and highlights the fact that in our faith journey, what we come to “is nothing known to the senses”. In the Old Testament, God’s people were guided in their journey by signs like a cloud or a blazing fire that served as point of reference for everyone.
In Christian culture, there have always been stable, sure signs that witnessed to the religious nature of the culture we belonged to. But now, with cultural Christianity’s demise, there is a call for interiority. The only meaningful support faith can have is to be sought in the inner life, not in the outside world. It is in the intimacy of our being that the basic attitudes of humility and gentleness give shape to who we are or want to be. The lack of those attitudes impoverish the connection between us all.
It is in the inner life that we are challenged to discover sure points of reference to guide us on our journey. Christian living had requisites which were written as a rule, and abiding by that rule was sufficient. Faith was even measured in quantifiable terms. But true faith has criteria that are not quantifiable, because mainly they pertain to interiority, to attitudes rather than behaviour.
American psychologist William James, reflecting on the multiplicity of roles people play, considered the possibility that a normal, healthy individual might be seen as containing multiple selves and not just as wearing multiple masks. Jesus touches precisely this sore point, suggesting how one can humbly not seek the place of honour and yet be truly honoured. He is ultimately suggesting the desire for a different, more simple and gentle way of being and of relating between people.