Praise be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.
In our last reflection on counsels for a holy and healthy spirituality, we spoke of the importance of humility, but we didn't have time to include St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus, her thoughts on that topic. We'll do that this morning.
One of the most prominent Old Testament verses in the Little Flower's spirituality was Proverbs 9:4, which says, “Whoever is a little one, let him come to me.” For St. Thérèse, humility and littleness are synonymous. Those who are humble are usually spiritually wise, and so they attribute all the goodness that they have or the good that they do; they attribute it to God, who is the source of all goodness.
St. Thérèse told one of her sisters that remaining a little child before God, quote, “means to acknowledge our nothingness, await everything from the good Lord, refuse to attribute to ourselves the virtues we practice, but believe that we are incapable of doing anything that is good.” In that, she's just echoing our Lord's words when He tells us in John 15:5, “Without Me, you can do nothing.”  The nature of love is to humble oneself, Thérèse would say, and she added that it is proper to divine love to lower itself; hence, the lower we are, the more we attract God. So whenever we humble our hearts or whenever we allow the events of life to humble us interiorly, we attract God's love, like a piece of metal attracts a magnet, right? Because as St. James tells us, “God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble,” James 4:6.
In regards to humility, St. Thérèse would add that we should love to see ourselves as we truly are, meaning deficient, imperfect, flawed, and totally dependent on God. Our struggles and our faults shouldn't frighten or discourage us; rather, they should direct us to placing our confidence and trust in God alone. Yes, on the one hand, we do have to work on practicing virtue and correcting ourselves as best as we can, but at the same time, we must also take to heart the fact that without our miseries, we would not attract God's mercy.
This is why St. Thérèse says that the lights and the insights which she received, which revealed to her her littleness and her nothingness and her incapacity, those things did more good for her than the lights of faith which she received. She writes this: “I know the means for being happy and drawing profit from my miseries. Jesus seems to encourage me on this road. He teaches me to profit from everything, both from the good and the evil that I find in myself.”  You know, when we see evil or selfishness inside of us, those are opportunities for us to simply humble our hearts and present ourselves as we are to the Lord. God is far more tender and loving and merciful towards us than we tend to give Him credit for. Those who are humble learn from their faults, and they learn not to beat themselves up about their faults and failings. Rather, they work on gently correcting themselves with the help and the grace of God, knowing that they will not be fault-free in this life. We will not be fault-free. And also knowing that God looks at the heart and our goodwill more than He looks at our faults. Lack of trust in God and a lack of goodwill can hurt the Lord. Faults, weaknesses, imperfections do not hurt or offend Him. In fact, they actually help to keep us humble.
Of course, sins are not pleasing to God, but they can be used by Him to help us humble our hearts. If we are humble, says Thérèse, if I'm humble, I'm entitled without offending the good Lord to do small, foolish things until I die. Look at little children. They constantly break things, tear them up, fall, and all the while, in spite of that, they love their parents very much, and vice versa. Well, when I fall in this way, like a child, it makes me realize my nothingness and my weakness all the better. And I say to myself, “What would become of me? What would I be able to accomplish if I were to rely on my own powers alone?”  Thérèse's thoughts echo those of St. Paul, who writes, “God said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.’ I will,” says St. Paul, “all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong,” says the apostle. And 2 Corinthians 12:9-10.
Writing to her cousin, Marie Guérin, Thérèse says this. She says, “You are mistaken, my dear friend, if you imagine that your little Thérèse walks with ardor in the path of virtue. She is feeble, very feeble. She feels that weakness every day. But Jesus is pleased to teach her the science of glorying in her infirmities. This is a great peace, and I pray Jesus to teach it also to you. For there alone are found peace and repose of heart.”  And lastly, St. Thérèse insists that we not just accept our littleness or our humble state; we must also look for ways to practice humility. Humility is not just passive acceptance of my nature and condition. It's also an active choice in how I go about my day and how I live my life. So how do we practice humility? Well, by accepting the humiliations that come our way, by not insisting on our own wills or preferences, by accepting when others judge us harshly or unfavorably, by welcoming corrections and inconveniences and allowing others to see and judge us as imperfect, by placing ourselves in the lowest places and serving those around us, by not responding with an eye-for-eye mentality when someone treats us badly, and just in general by thinking well of others too.
As St. Anthony of the Desert once said, he said, “I saw all the devil's traps set upon the earth and I groaned and I said, ‘Who do you think can pass through them?’ And I heard a voice saying, ‘Humility.’”  If the spirituality that I've adopted and embraced is not fostering a deeper humility in my soul, then it needs to be replaced very simply.
May Our Lady grant us the grace to have truly humble hearts as we go forward in the spiritual life.  Praised be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.