Spiritual childhood is necessary to obtain eternal life

"Spiritual childhood is thus a necessary condition to obtain eternal life. What does that mean? Is it necessary to idealize childhood to the point of forgetting its defects and weaknesses? Is it necessary to become childish and lose the wisdom of adulthood? No, certainly not. On the contrary, we must put to work all of the faculties and aptitudes that God has given to us. It does not mean thinking, speaking, feeling and acting like a child. Saint Paul warns us about this: That henceforth we be no more children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine... But doing the truth in charity, we may in all things grow up in Him who is the head, Christ (Eph. 4: 14-15). And again: Brethren, do not become children in sense: but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect (1 Cor. 14: 20). No matter how much the freshness of childhood moves us, we must not forget that its unfinished state calls for maturity. The emotional nature of the child is both tyrannical and selfish. The child seeks to control the beloved more than to give himself to the beloved, and thus does not offer a good example.

Our Lord desires something else when He asks us to become children again. The way of childhood, as Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus said, consists essentially "in a disposition of the heart, which makes us humble and small in the arms of God, conscious of our weakness, and confident even unto boldness in His fatherly goodness" (Novissima Verba). In the light of affirmations of the faith, it makes us conscious of reality: it is God alone who permits us to be, to love, to act, above all on the supernatural level. Our spiritual life cannot be an initiative on our part with respect to God: it can only be a placing of ourselves in the hands of Him who is infinitely good, who loves us freely, with a primary and creative love: For whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God (Rom. 8: 14).

This attitude recognizes a link of total dependence with respect to God, excludes the feeling of pride in oneself, the presumption of reaching a supernatural goal by human means, and the foolish wish of sufficing unto oneself at the time of peril and temptation. It makes us practice "humility, the kind and sincere humility of the heart, total fidelity to our duty of state, whatever it may be, in whatever sphere and at whatever level of the human hierarchy that God has placed us and called on us to work, a disposition to all sacrifices, confident abandonment in the hand and Heart of God, and above all true charity, the real love of God, true tenderness for Jesus Christ, answering to the tenderness that He Himself showed toward us, this charity that is benevolent, patient, always active and putting up with anything, prepared for self-sacrifice, even to give up one's life.... Spiritual childhood is accessible and necessary for everyone. As Saint Augustine observes, not everyone can preach and do great works. But who isn't capable of praying, of humbling oneself and of loving?" (Pius XI, February 11, 1923)."

--By Dom Antoine Marie, osb, Newsletter of 15 January, 1997

Reprinted with the kind permission of the monks at Clairval

All the good that is in us comes from God

"Humility is charitable, interpreting all things for the best and pitying and excusing the faults of others as much as possible. For this reason St. Peter, wishing to exhort us to love and have compassion upon our fellow-creatures, also exhorts us at the same time to be humble: "Having compassion one of another, being lovers of the brotherhood-----humble," [1 Pet. iii, 8] for there can be no charity without humility, and therefore to censure and criticize too readily the actions of our neighbors and to judge and speak ill of them are vices which are directly opposed to the virtue of humility. Who has given me the power to judge my brethren? When I thus constitute myself their judge and in the tribunal of my thoughts condemn first one and then another, I am usurping an authority I do not possess and which belongs to God alone: "For God is Judge." [Ps. xlix, 6] And if this is not pride, what is pride? In punishment of such arrogance God often permits us to fall into the very faults that we have condemned in others, and it is well for us to remember the teaching of St. Paul: "Wherefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest. For wherein thou judgest another thou condemnest thyself." [Rom. ii, 1] There is always some pharisaical pride in the heart of him who judges and speaks evil of others, because in belittling others he exalts himself. It is in vain that we try hard cover our evil-speaking under ,the veil of some good motive; it must always be the result of pride which is quick to find out the weaknesses of others while remaining blind to its own.

If we are guilty of pride let us try and amend and not flatter ourselves that we possess the smallest degree of humility, until by our good resolutions carefully carried out we have mortified our evil tendency to speak ill of our neighbor. Let us hearken to the Holy Ghost: "Where pride is there also shall be reproach, but where humility is there also is wisdom." [Prov. xi, 2]

The proud man is scornful and arrogant in his speech; and the humble alone knows how to speak well and wisely. If there is humility in the heart it will be manifested in the speech, because "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good."  [Luke vi, 45] 


But in order to acquire humility, it is necessary also to be prudent in not speaking well of oneself. "Let another praise thee," says the inspired word, "and not thy own mouth, a stranger and not thy own lips." [Prov. xxvii, 11]


It is very easy for us to fall into this fault of praising ourselves "Until it becomes a habit, and with this habit so opposed to humility how can we be humble?


What good qualities have we of our own for which we can praise ourselves? All the good that is in us comes from God, and to Him alone we must give praise and honor. When, therefore, we praise ourselves we are usurping glory which is due to God alone. Even though in praising ourselves we sometimes refer all to the honor of God, it matters little; when there is no absolute necessity it is better to abstain from self-praise, for although we refer all to the glory of God with our lips, our ingenious and subtle self-love cannot fail to appropriate it secretly. And even speaking depreciatingly of ourselves there may lurk some hypocritical pride in our words, such as was mentioned by the sage of old when he said: "There is one that humbleth himself wickedly, and his interior is full of deceit." [Ecclus xix, 23]


Therefore we can never watch over ourselves enough, because there is nothing that teaches us so well to know the pride of our heart as our words, with which we either reveal or hide the depravity of our affections. And this is the characteristic of the proud, according to St. Bernard: "One who boastfully proclaims what he is, or lies about what he is not." [Epist. lxxxvii]

Let us bear in heart and mind this precious advice given by Tobias to his son: "Never suffer pride to reign in thy mind or in thy words." [Tob. iv, 14] The words of a proud man are nauseous, whether he speaks of himself or others, and they are hated both by God and man: therefore we should detest this vice, not only from the Christian but also from the human standpoint."


-- Humility of Heart by Fr Cajetan Mary da Bergamo

Lift up your eyes and fix them on God

O Lord, my heart is not exalted, neither have my eyes been lifted up.

1. This Psalm, a short one, which demands an analytical rather than a homiletical treatment, teaches us the lesson of humility and meekness. Now, as we have in a great number of other places spoken about humility, there is no need to repeat the same things here. Of course we are bound to bear in mind in how great need our faith stands of humility when we hear the Prophet thus speaking of it as equivalent to the performance of the highest works: O Lord, my heart is not exalted. For a troubled heart is the noblest sacrifice in the eyes of God. The heart, therefore, must not be lifted up by prosperity, but humbly kept within the bounds of meekness through the fear of God.

2. Neither have My eyes been lifted up. The strict sense of the Greek here conveys a different meaning; οὐδὲ ἐμετεωρίσθησαν οἱ ὀφθαλμοί μου, that is, have not been lifted up from one object to look on another. Yet the eyes must be lifted up in obedience to the Prophet's words: Lift up your eyes and see who has displayed all these things. Isaiah 40:26 And the Lord says in the gospel: Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields, that they are white unto harvest. John 4:35 The eyes, then, are to be lifted up: not, however, to transfer their gaze elsewhere, but to remain fixed once for all upon that to which they have been raised.

3. Then follows: Neither have I walked amid great things, nor amid wonderful things that are above me. It is most dangerous to walk amid mean things, and not to linger amid wonderful things. God's utterances are great; He Himself is wonderful in the highest: how then can the psalmist pride himself as on a good work for not walking amid great and wonderful things? It is the addition of the words, which are above me, that shows that the walking is not amid those things which men commonly regard as great and wonderful. For David, prophet and king as he was, once was humble and despised and unworthy to sit at his father's table; but he found favour with God, he was anointed to be king, he was inspired to prophesy. His kingdom did not make him haughty, he was not moved by hatreds: he loved those that persecuted him, he paid honour to his dead enemies, he spared his incestuous and murderous children. In his capacity of sovereign he was despised, in that of father he was wounded, in that of prophet he was afflicted; yet he did not call for vengeance as a prophet might, nor exact punishment as a father, nor requite insults as a sovereign. And so he did not walk amid things great and wonderful which were above him.

4. Let us see what comes next: If I was not humble-minded but have lifted up my soul. What inconsistency on the Prophet's part! He does not lift up his heart: he does lift up his soul. He does not walk amid things great and wonderful that are above him; yet his thoughts are not mean. He is exalted in mind and cast down in heart. He is humble in his own affairs: but he is not humble in his thought. For his thought reaches to heaven, his soul is lifted up on high. But his heart, out of which proceed, according to the Gospel, evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, railings Matthew 15:19, is humble, pressed down beneath the gentle yoke of meekness. We must strike a middle course, then, between humility and exaltation, so that we may be humble in heart but lifted up in soul and thought.

5. Then he goes on: Like a weaned child upon his mother's breast, so will you reward my soul. We are told that when Isaac was weaned Abraham made a feast because now that he was weaned he was on the verge of boyhood and was passing beyond milk food. The Apostle feeds all that are imperfect in the faith and still babes in the things of God with the milk of knowledge. Thus to cease to need milk marks the greatest possible advance. Abraham proclaimed by a joyful feast that his son had come to stronger meat, and the Apostle refuses bread to the carnal-minded and those that are babes in Christ. And so the Prophet prays that God, because he has not lifted up his heart, nor walked amid things great and wonderful that are above him, because he has not been humble-minded but did lift up his soul, may reward his soul, lying like a weaned child upon his mother: that is to say that he may be deemed worthy of the reward of the perfect, heavenly and living bread, on the ground that by reason of his works already recorded he has now passed beyond the stage of milk.

6. But he does not demand this living bread from heaven for himself alone, he encourages all mankind to hope for it by saying: Let Israel hope in the Lord from henceforth and for evermore. He sets no temporal limit to our hope, he bids our faithful expectation stretch out into infinity. We are to hope for ever and ever, winning the hope of future life through the hope of our present life which we have in Christ Jesus our Lord, Who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

-- Homily on Psalm 130/131 by St Hilary of Poitiers (doctor of the Church) in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers

The Lord seeks the little and humble ones

"The Lord seeks the little and humble ones; be much so of heart to reach intimate union with Him."


-- St Maravillas of Jesus
translated by ocdsister


** Painting by Greg Olsen

Let Him guide you

"Let Him guide you wherever He wants, without sadness or worries."


-- St Maravillas of Jesus
translated by ocdsister


** This painting, by Greg Olsen, is appropriately titled Take My Hand

Ash Wednesday

"Let the one truly possessed by the love of Christ keep his commandments. Who can express the binding power of divine love? Who can find words for the splendor of its beauty? Beyond all description are the heights to which it lifts us. Love unites us to God; "it cancels innumerable sins," has no limits to its endurance, bears everything patiently. Love is neither servile nor arrogant. It does not provoke schisms or form cliques, but always acts in harmony with others. By it all God's chosen ones have been sanctified; without it, it is impossible to please him. Out of love the Lord took us to himself; because he loved us and it was God's will, our Lord Jesus Christ gave his life's blood for us -- he gave his body for our body, his soul for our soul.

See then, beloved, what a great and wonderful thing love is, and how inexpressible its perfection. Who are worthy to possess it unless God makes them so? To him therefore we must turn, begging of his mercy that there may be found in us a love free from human partiality and beyond reproach. Every generation from Adam's time to ours has passed away; but those who by God's grace were made perfect in love and have a dwelling now among the saints, and when at last the kingdom of Christ appears, they will be revealed. "Take shelter in your rooms for a little while," says Scripture, "until my wrath subsides. Then I will remember the good days, and will raise you from your graves."

Happy are we, beloved, if love enables us to live in harmony and in the observance of God's commandments, for then it will also gain for us the remission of our sins. Scripture pronounces "happy those whose transgressions are pardoned, whose sins are forgiven. Happy the one," it says, "to whom the Lord imputes no fault, on whose lips there is no guile." This is the blessing given those whom God has chosen through Jesus Christ our Lord. To him be glory for ever and ever.

Let us fix our attention on the blood of Christ and recognize how precious it is to God his Father, since it was shed for our salvation and brought the grace of repentance to all the world.

If we review the various ages of history, we will see that in every generation the Lord has "offered the opportunity of repentance" to any who were willing to turn to him. When Noah preached God's message of repentance, all who listened to him were saved. Jonah told the Ninevites they were going to be destroyed, but when they repented, their prayers gained God's forgiveness for their sins, and they were saved, even though they were not of God's people.

Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the ministers of God's grace have spoken of repentance; indeed, the Master of the whole universe himself spoke of repentance with an oath: "As I live," says the Lord, "I do not wish the death of the sinner but the sinner's repentance." He added this evidence of his goodness: "House of Israel, repent of your wickedness. Tell my people: If their sins should reach from earth to heaven, if they are brighter than scarlet and blacker than sackcloth, you need only turn to me with your whole heart and say, `Father,' and I will listen to you as to a holy people."

In other words, God wanted all his beloved ones to have the opportunity to repent and he confirmed this desire by his own almighty will. That is why we should obey his sovereign and glorious will and prayerfully entreat his mercy and kindness. We should be suppliant before him and turn to his compassion, rejecting empty works and quarreling and jealousy which only lead to death.

We should be humble in mind, putting aside all arrogance, pride, and foolish anger. Rather, we should act in accordance with the Scriptures, as the Holy Spirit says: "The wise must not glory in wisdom nor the strong in strength nor the rich in riches. Rather, let the one who glories glory in the Lord, by seeking him and doing what is right and just." Recall especially what the Lord Jesus said when he taught gentleness and forbearance. "Be merciful," he said, "so that you may have mercy shown to you. Forgive, so that you may be forgiven. As you treat others, so you will be treated. As you give, so you will receive. As you judge, so you will be judged. As you are kind to others, so you will be treated kindly. The measure of your giving will be the measure of your receiving."

Let these commandments and precepts strengthen us to live in humble obedience to his sacred words. As Scripture asks: "Whom shall I look upon with favor except the humble, peaceful one who trembles at my words?"

Sharing then in the heritage of so many vast and glorious achievements, let us hasten toward the goal of peace, set before us from the beginning. Let us keep our eyes firmly fixed on the Father and Creator of the whole universe, and hold fast to his splendid and transcendent gifts of peace and all his blessings."

--From a letter of St Clement I to the Corinthians

May I welcome you, Lord!

Welcome to you, Lord! The fruits of the earth are offered to those who opened the hands willingly. You come, make yourself a personal gift and become a cross for me, how I am wretched, Lord! I am capable of suffering when you come, I am able to feel the weigh of your burden. And holiness is to receive you. You that descended because I did not make the effort to climb. May my life kneel: then, on the bare ground I will understand the mystery of the gift made to my land.

-- Servant of God Anastasio Cardinal Ballestrero, ocd (Fr Anastasius of the Holy Rosary)

translated by ocdsister

I wish to make you a confidence

Listen, my Jesus, I wish to make you a confidence ...
You know me well
and not hidden to you is my overall helplessness.
Well, it is precisely the weakness that leans to the fortitude
helplessness to the power of God ...
in short, it is my own smallness
that makes me happy and makes me live in You!


-- Bl Elia of St Clement, ocd
translated by ocdsister
** Painting by Greg Olsen

Sorrow for sin is consoling

"Sorrow for sin is consoling. But the fretting of soul that arises because we have not come up to our own expectations is not true sorrow for sin. Sorrow for sin arises from a conviction that we have not come up to God’s expectations. Remorse is indeed painful, but remorse is merely the clamor of conscience scolding the soul for its failures; it may lead to sorrow for the past, or the rebuke may be silenced by the new and repeated excesses.

But true sorrow for sin is consoling. Pride may chafe us, because we are not as good as we thought we were; right reason may torture us, because we have acted through passion and wrong reason. Sorrow for sin, however, is humble and is submissive and obedient to right reason. Penitence is healing of the contrite in heart."

-- How to love as Jesus loves: unlocking the treasures of Christ’s Sacred Heart by Fr Francis P Donnelly, SJ

His life was one of humility

"'And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was subject to them' [Luke 2:51]. He went down, he humbled himself - his life was one of humility. Being God, you took the appearance of a man; as a man, you made yourself the least of men. Your life was one of lowliness: the place you took was the lowest of all. You went down with them to live their life with them, the life of the poor laborer, living by working. Your life, like theirs, was one of work and poverty. They were obscure, and you lived in the shade of their obscurity....

I must believe no work beneath me, for Jesus was a carpenter for thirty years, and Joseph all his life.... I must welcome with love and readiness any occasion for humility...."

-- Charles de Foucauld edited by Robert Ellsberg

Suffering makes known to God the soul's need for Him

"Suffering is good: guard it as a precious thing. Far better than any words of ours can do, it makes known to God the soul's need for Him. What causes our suffering is the disproportion we see between what we are and what He is. A soul would be petty, indeed, if it did not suffer from that knowledge. But this suffering diminishes that disproportion, and comes from the very effort we are making to reach Him. With the effort, however, is given grace: He giveth grace to the humble. There you have true humility, and it is the reason for all the graces we have received (and they are much greater than we realize). Humility acknowledges these graces: it would not be true humility if it did not. What hast though that thou hast not received? St Paul does not overlook the hast, and we must never forget it either. But he reminds us that all that we have received is the gift of God - we have received it. And what we have received is the pledge of what we shall receive. We must never mind facing our misery, but we should always bring it to God's mercy, which is ever inclined towards it in order to raise it up."

-- They Speak by Silences by A Carthusian

Our embrace of God will be in accordance with our embrace of his will...

"Here then (...) is the fruit of Christ's prayer. Because he contemplates as any other human being and because His prayer is a constant heart-to-heart communication with God - or more precisely, a dwelling in God - it is a total and immensely heroic obedience. He has one care only: to obey God. He is rooted in obedience as faithfully as he is rooted in prayer.

We follow the opposite path. Christ started out from contemplation to come to the perfection of obedience. We must start out from the perfection of obedience to arrive at contemplation. This is the reverse route we must follow. In the depths of our being, our prayer is worth what our obedience is worth. Our embrace of God will be in accordance with our embrace of his will...

Let us consider, then, what constituted this profound prayer in the soul of Christ. Let us contemplate the great mysteries of the Beatific Vision and the Hypostatic Union. Let us go to work courageously to welcome God within us, so that we can know the immense nourishment to be derived from constant, deep prayer. We will reach out for this prayer with humility and obedience. To understand happiness for the presence of God and to have a foretaste of heaven here below, let us take the necessary steps, while repeating the words found in our Office: 'Taste and see the goodness of the Lord' [Ps 34:9]. May we experience the truth of his words and may we likewise know the road that leads to him."

-- Fr Jaques of Jesus, ocd
Cited in Père Jacques: Resplendent in Victory by Francis Murphy, SJ

Though Fr Jacques was addressing discalced nuns, his counsel of obedience applies to all. Obedience to whom, you may ask. Obedience to parents, obedience to superiors (ie, spiritual directors), obedience to the Magisterium of the Church. We may disagree with something, perhaps due to a lack of understanding or ignorance, but humble submission in a spirit of faith will bring us closer to Christ, help us grow in virtue. Moral theologians teach that unless we're asked to do something that is obviously a sin (ie, against Church teaching), we should be obedient to the best of our abilities. Look at Christ, already a grown man and God in the flesh, and He obeyed His Mother when she asked Him for help when the newly wed couple at Cana ran out of wine. And Denis the Carthusian said: "If you are doubtful whether a command is contrary to the law of God you should follow the command of your director because even if it is against the law of God, the one who obeys does not sin." It's not easy to be obedient, but we must try to be so, and ask for the virtue of obedience.

God defends the humble soul

"O my Jesus, nothing is better for the soul than humiliations. In contempt is the secret of happiness, when the soul recognizes that, of itself, it is only wretchedness and nothingness, and that whatever it possesses of good is a gift of God. When the soul sees that everything is given it freely and that the only thing it has of itself is its own misery, this is what sustains it in a continual act of humble prostration before the majesty of God. And God, seeing the soul in such a disposition, pursues it with His graces. As the soul continues to immerse itself more deeply into the abyss of its nothingness and need, God uses His omnipotence to exalt it. If there is a truly happy soul upon earth, it can only be a truly humble soul. At first, one's self-love suffers greatly on this account, but after a soul has struggled courageously, God grants it much light by which it sees how wretched and full of deception everything is. God alone is in its heart. A humble soul does not trust itself, but places all its confidence in God. God defends the humble soul and lets Himself into its secrets, and the soul abides in unsurpassable happiness which no one can comprehend."

-- Diary: Divine Mercy in My Soul by St Faustina Kowalska

Prayer to obtain humility

“Learn from me” O Jesus! When you travelled on earth, you said: “Learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart. Your souls will find rest.” O powerful monarch of the heavens, yes, my soul finds rest in seeing you clothed with the form and nature of a slave (Phil 2:7), lowering yourself to the point of washing the feet of your apostles. Then I remember those words that you said so as to teach me to practice humility: “What I just did was to give you an example: as I have done, so you must do…The disciple is not greater than his master. Once you know all these things, blest will you be if you put them into practice.” (Jn 13:15-17) I understand them, Lord, I understand these words that came forth from your gentle and humble heart; with the help of your grace, I want to put them into practice.

I want to humbly lower myself and to submit my will to that of my sisters, not contradicting them in anything and without seeking whether they have the right to command me. O my Beloved, no one had this right where you were concerned, and nevertheless you obeyed not only the Blessed Virgin and Saint Joseph, but even those who tortured you. Now I see you bringing your annihilations to the full in the host. How humble you are, o divine King of Glory… O my Beloved, how gentle and humble of heart you appear to me hidden behind the veil of the white host!… O Jesus, gentle and humble of heart, make my heart like yours.

-- Composed by St Thérèse of Lisieux for a novice

The Hidden Christ

"JESUS CHRIST is working in His hidden state at the task of my sanctification. In order to become a Saint I must conquer pride and replace it with humility. In the Eucharist, Jesus gives me the example and the grace of humility.

He is the One Who uttered these words: "Learn of Me that I am meek and humble of heart." But humility would have been little better than a name during the last eighteen centuries, if our Lord had left us only the memory of the examples of His mortal life. We could say, and with reason, "But, Lord, I have not seen Thee humbled!"

Well then, Jesus Christ is there to answer our excuses, our complaints. The words, "Learn of Me that I am meek and humble of heart," come to us in a special way from the tabernacle, from behind the veil of the Host. "Learn of Me to conceal your good works, your virtues, your sacrifices; come down, come down toward Me." The grace of humility is found in the humiliated state of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament. What human glory can fear abasing itself since the King of glory abases Himself so much? What rich man will not prize the lovable poverty of Jesus Hostia? Who will refuse to obey God and those who represent Him, when God Himself obeys man?"

-- The Real Presence by St Peter Julian Eymard