Theirs Would Be the Nobility of Humility

Two things have been on my mind lately: humility and castles. 

Humility

I’ve always struggled with humility. Even hearing the word used to make me cringe. A short visit to my family seems to magnify what I already know is inside me: a desire for control, a desperate need to defend myself even when I know I might be wrong. Perhaps my mom says something she heard on the news that I don’t agree with, or my dad makes a sweeping statement about “kids these days” that gets under my skin. I sense a quick, biting one liner boiling up in me to tell them how wrong they are. Mine is not a quiet perfectionism that is content with self-critique. For some reason I want to perfect the whole world around me and allow myself to be tricked into thinking my stinging remark will be just the thing to correct it. 

I’ve prayed the Litany of Humility occasionally since I was in high school (linked below), yet somehow even the word humility left a bad taste in my mouth. It seemed if I grew in humility, I would never get my way in anything. Would humility mean letting my boss, or parents, or loudest friends decide how my days would unfold? I’m slowly learning why humility is not about hiding our desires or opinions or hurts. Humility means surrendering all our desires and thoughts and wounds to the Father and trusting Him. More on that later...

Castles

I just finished reading St. Teresa of Avila’s Interior Castle; her wisdom and deep, mystical prayer life spilled over into soaring descriptions of the spiritual life in all its graces and adventure. She uses the image of a person moving from outside castle walls, through the halls, and into the deepest interior, the shining room where the King Himself dwells and draws us into His own life. I rewatched Narnia and revisited a lovely book called The Princess and the Goblin and found myself drawn into the magnificent stories of kings, queens, and their childlike sense of courageous trust. 

Humility and Castles?

I wondered why the Lord was juxtaposing these themes of castles and humility in my mind and life. To me, castles had everything to do with strength, firmness, elegance. Humility had to do with vulnerability, weakness, flexibility, and poverty. I tried to imagine what royalty celebrating and feasting comfortably in grand halls had to do with monastic images of fasting, praying, and simplicity.

Then, I read a line in Venerable Fulton Sheen’s masterful work, The Life of Christ. He wrote about Jesus washing the feet of the disciples, and he described Peter’s objections to Jesus’ humble, foot-washing love. He wrote of how the Apostles, in their ambition, missed the point of the Servant of Servants, who was at the same time the King of Kings right in front of them. Sheen wrote, “Our Lord admitted that, in a certain sense, His Apostles were kings; neither did He deny their instinct for aristocracy, but theirs was to be the nobility of humility, the greatest becoming the least.” 

It would seem that humility is the place where expectations go to die, yet time and again in the lives of the Saints, we see the only thing burned to ash in them is that which was not of God. All else in the Saints is raised up, glorified, made new, and put at the service of the King of Kings who loves humbly. 

The nobility of humility might strike us as strange, near impossible. Here, I call to mind what the English author Belloc points out about the original meaning of the word paradox which is not “nonsense through contradiction” but rather, “illumination by juxtaposition.” So how can nobility and humility presented together reveal to us the deepest meaning of both words?

Castles are secure places, yet humility also requires us to be secure. Secure in our identity as sons and daughters of the King. Nobility involves a title, yet humility requires us to live with an ever present understanding that this title of a son or daughter of God is not a title we could obtain for ourselves. This is an identity gifted from the Father who takes the loving initiative to call us to Himself. The prideful grasping at control I let overtake me when visiting my family was anything but secure. 

Castles are indeed a place of celebration. Humility too knows how to celebrate: how to celebrate others, how to celebrate the realities of life without fear, how to celebrate small moments and grand moments.

Castles when seen in the distance might seem intimidating or uninviting, but once inside, a person can begin to see the beauty of the interior. Growing in humility too seems insurmountable, yet with the grace of God and some effort on our part, we begin to see how humility beautifully adorns our soul and makes it a more welcoming place for others, including Christ Himself, to come dwell.

Let us pray for the humility to hear the voice of the King, that we may say to others only what He would have us say, that we would have the courage to receive our identity as a gift. 

Let us pray that we will love with humility and live forever in the courts of the Servant of Servants and King of Kings.