I was told on Saturday that I needed to be humbled. It was said in jest, in a funny part of a conversation after a pretty serious conversation. It was said to lighten the mood, and to bring some levity. As many of these conversations leave the speakers mouth, they stay with me for some time. I find the need to consider many different points- whether it is to accept and take what is said as truth- or if there is a need to dismiss the point and move on.
One of the best things that I have done since moving to DC is in the last 4 months, I registered to receive some theological sayings from Church of the Saviour in their daily Inward/Outward reflections. Today’s was on humility. (I often marvel at God's ability to reinforce a thought that is so easily dismissed in the heat of the moment.) It reads:
Humble and Free
Conrad Hyers
Humility is not thinking lowly of oneself; it is not thinking of oneself. The humble person is free--free to be concerned about others, free to be at the disposal of others, free to see the worth of others.
What does it mean to be humble in my life? I know that I have gifts and talents that God has given me. Some are discovered and in use, some have been discarded because I wasted them, others have yet to be uncovered. How concerned am I about others though? I remember when I first moved to Brookland, I was so wanting to be a part of the community- to really understand and establish in my own life what community, neighborhood means and to accept life in Brookland. How do I show and embrace compassion for others? I know that is really tough for me. I feel so encumbered by my life and work sometimes that I want to be nothing but naughty in my life outside of work- I want to gossip, I want to be nasty to others, I want to embrace the seduction of a secular life that tells me there are no consequences to any choice- it feels good, wonderful, sexy, so I should do it. I don’t want to work on relationships that are broken, I want to be able to wallow in a woe is me time. My life is so boring in other ways. The challenge though is that this is far from authentic.
So, why isn’t authentic easier? Well, I think that in being humble, authenticity comes a bit cleaner- not necessarily easier, just more well expressed in daily life and expression. The form of the question then becomes, “how do I accept humility-my humbling in my life?”
Who brings the thought of humility to my life? I think first of Jesus- his humility to suffer the humilitation of the cross which would bring humanity to redemption. But when I think a bit longer I see Mary. Mary who witnessed the humiliation of a teen pregnancy- an almost failed engagement- an immigrant life-a son who was never accepted in society and ultimately killed as a criminal of the state. I wonder as a woman- the older I get what this would have meant to Mary to go through each of these trials.
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