Like this little child
October 4, 2010
St. Francis of AssisiDear Family of Mary!"Dear children; Today I call you to a humble, my children, humble devotion. Your hearts need to be just." (October 2, 2010)"Dear children! Today I am with you and bless you all with my motherly blessing of peace, and I urge you to live your life of faith even more, because you are still weak and are not humble." (September 25, 2010)
Through both Marija and Mirjana, Our Lady speaks to us of humility. I don't know about you, but when I hear the word "humble" it makes me nervous. I want to run the other way! What could be the trouble here? So I asked the Lord in my journal to explain it to me. (What better day to pray about humility, than on St. Francis' Feast Day! Thank you, St. Francis!) And here is what I heard: Lord, why am I so conflicted about being humble. I know I am not humble. But I don't even really want to be humble. It just seems too impossible!Yes, true humility is impossible. The more you strive to be humble, the farther from it you will get. As long as you are trying to form your own virtue, on your own power, and with the desire to make yourself into something else you will be acting out of pride. And nothing done out of pride will ever produce humility.
Ok, that makes some sense. But if it is impossible for me to make myself humble, how can it ever happen? Well first you have to understand what humility is. Humility is not humiliation. Most people think that humility comes from humiliation. The lower you are on the human scale of things, the more humble you will be. And many are acquainted with the pain of humiliation. In your fallen world, your dignity is constantly being challenged and disfigured by the mistreatment of others. My children are so often mistreated and denigrated, even in their families. And through this terrible treatment, they grow fearful and empty inside. They fear that they will never be good enough, and they resort to pride as their only wall against such denigration. Yes, I think humiliation is the experience that most frightens me, and keeps me from loving humility.Exactly! You fear humility because you think it will make you vulnerable to humiliation, and renew your old wounds. Yes, Lord. That is true. I want to defend myself.Ok, so now let's talk about what humility really is. Ok. Shoot!Do you remember when I placed a little child in the midst of my disciples and I told them,"Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like thischild, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven"? (Mt 18:3-4) Yes, Lord. I do remember it. Look at the child. Think of how small and vulnerable that child was in the midst of the disciples. Did the child understand what I was doing? Did that little one "do" anything in that situation? No, I guess that child just stood there and maybe looked up at You, and held Your hand, and trusted You. Maybe he was a little afraid of all the big men around him, but he had You there to protect him, so he could just stand there and be looked at. Right. He was close to me, close to my warm body. He felt me near. He knew I loved him, and he trusted Me. So in peace, he just was.So that is humility? Yes. If you are so united to me, so trusting and small with me, if you know that I am leading and guiding you and that you are in My hands, you are in humility. All humility comes from your relationship with Me. I know infinitely more than you do, just as I knew more than that child. I am your defender and your shepherd. With Me, you can just "be". That is humility. And because you know that your being has been a gift from the Father and Me, you are a creature in our care, you can rest in humility and trust always. You can be humble because you are Mine. You don't belong to yourself, you are Mine. So then, humility is the fruit of growing in my relationship to You, Jesus. It is just what comes into me as I pray more and more, and experience Your love for me? Yes! That is why Mother counsels you to pray, pray, pray. She knows what you need. You need Me, and the only way to receive me is through prayer of the heart. If you would be humble, you must pray a great deal, and let Me come to you. Then someday I will place you in the midst of the "disciples" and they will then learn from you, as they learned from that little child. Your witness will be like his. So that is what I heard from Jesus about humility. It sure makes sense. Humility comes from knowing Jesus! He is the bright sun of day that outshines every other light. He is the love that out loves every other love. Loving Jesus makes our devotion humble, and trusting Him makes us humble. It is just the truth of things. We are little and He is all! I hope I will not fear humility anymore. What a joy it is to be humble! It means I can be close to Jesus in the reality of who I am and who He is!! In Jesus and Mary!
Cathy Nolan
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