Pride is centered in what? - - I
I subscribe to ‘The Twelve Step Review’, a publication of the Western Dominican Province. In the upcoming issues, they will look into the Seven Deadly Sins. (Now where did I see that before? God has a good sense of humor.) They begin with Pride. I will quote from the paper text that speak loudest to me.
Bishop Sheen once remarked: ‘God does not love us because we are lovely or lovable. His love exists not on account of our character, but on account of His. Our highest experience is responsive, not initiative. And it is only because we are loved by Him, that we are lovable.‘
On PRIDE:
If a person has never experienced God’s free gift of His love, then a person is subject to the forces of that original wound in which we were conceived. He then seeks to be the source of his own excellence, which is pride. To desire to be the source of one’s own excellence was the sin of Lucifer. It is something that belongs only to God.
The devil has great power over us because of that cold pride that demands that love must be merited. We are afraid of being unlovable and we are afraid of dying. This fear can be provoked in us by the devil.
Christ offers us the path of freedom, which is expressly manifest in the Easter mystery which we celebrate each time we attend Holy Mass; the mystery of Christ’s passion, death and resurrection which sets us free from the power of sin and death.
On HUMILITY:
Humility is simply the growing awareness that “of myself I am nothing; Jesus does the work.”
Real humility comes when we stop comparing ourselves to others and accept ourselves as we are. It is an honest assessment of oneself, no better, no worse than you really are.
When we let go of the need to compare ourselves to others, we let go of a great deal of anxiety. When we let go of the need to be critical of others, we let go of the fear of being diminished by others and their successes. Humility isn’t thinking less of oneself, it is thinking of oneself less.
