I often compare myself to other people — both in good and bad ways. How can I grow in humility?
When you wish to grow in a particular virtue, it is usually clear what you must do. If you want to grow in temperance, you should stop eating the third cookie after dinner. To grow in fortitude, you should have that difficult but important conversation with your friend. But how to grow in humility?
Once there was a man who decided he would work on being humble for six months. Halfway through he realized, “Wow! I’m really becoming much more humble. I am really good at being humble. In fact, I’m far better than most at this humility… Oh! Wait! Ahhh!”
Humility is tricky, because we subconsciously use our observations of other people in order to gauge how well we are doing in a particular virtue. I want to offer a simple and very practical way to become truly humble: Be grateful for the gifts that God has given to other people. Take time each day to thank God for the gifts that were not given to you, but have been given to others. Thank God for your smart classmate, your beautiful sister or that your friend has many grandchildren. Simply be happy that someone has received a gift, and the gift is good.
“God has so constructed the body … so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same concern for one another. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy” (1 Corinthians 12:24-27). While a gift is possessed by the one who uses it, it is received by anyone who is grateful for it. It is a very pure form of charity to rejoice in the good of another person. When you practice gratitude for another’s gift, you enter much more deeply into the life of the mystical body.
Furthermore, this is great practice for the kingdom of heaven! Part of the secret to heavenly joy is realizing that gratitude, moreso than possessing a particular gift, constitutes holiness. St. Therese never left her small convent, yet she had greater joy in the success of missionaries than they had themselves. She received their gifts by living as the heartbeat of the Church. A grateful heart is a humble heart. A humble heart is a happy heart.
Father Charlie Archer is associate pastor of St. Peter Parish in Kirkwood.
