WEEK TEN: TWO STANDARDS, THREE CLASSES OF MEN, THREE KINDS OF HUMILITY - Day 5
MORNING FACE TO FACE WITH GOD:
Begin with Prayer to the Holy Spirit
THREE KINDS OF HUMILITY, # 165-168
Read the Reflection; then pray using # 165-168; beg our Lord to choose me for the third kind of humility so that I may the more imitate and serve God, provided equal or greater praise and service be given to the Divine Majesty (# 168).
The consideration on Three Kinds of Humility reiterates what has gone before in the Two Standards and Three Classes of Men. It is not enough to serve God to the extent that one would not commit serious sin. Nor is it enough to serve and love God to the point where one would not offend God deliberately in small matters. Even more, St. Ignatius is inviting the disciple to reach for intimacy and union with God by identifying with the crucified Jesus, by coming to understand that there is a special joy and freedom in desiring "to choose poverty with Christ poor; insults with Christ loaded with them, rather than honors; to be accounted as worthless and a fool for Christ, rather than to be esteemed as wise and prudent in this world." The teacher invites the disciple into his own kenosis. In covenant living, one lives completely for the other. Jesus did this for us, and is inviting us to do the same. The way of covenant life is the way of the cross, constantly making the effort to lay one's life down for the other!
168)
Note
If one desires to attain this third kind of humility, it will help very much to use the three colloquies at the close of the meditation on the three Classes of Men mentioned above. He should beg our Lord to deign to choose him for this third kind of humility, which is higher and better, that he may the more imitate and serve Him, provided equal or greater praise and service be given to the Divine Majesty.
There is nothing I can do on my own without the grace of God. Jesus as Son of Man, God's perfect creation required God's grace to go into the world and stand against it, not for his own vein glory but for the glory of the Kingdom. This is the choice that God gives each of us, our own vein glory or the glory of the Kingdom.
What is God saying to you? Jesus sat in the silence and pondered the day, He sought My help and followed My direction. There was nothing that ruffled His feathers, He was at complete peace. This is what you hope to attain, neither for or against, neither with or without.
Dear Heavenly Father, You give us what we desire or allow it to be with our free will. I see a world choosing self and turning away from You. I see a world choosing new over old proven values. I pray for our culture, I pray for our children, I pray for Tradition. Watch over us this day Lord, see us coming and going, help us recognize You in the other and be the peace that we desire. I ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Mary, Queen of Peace, Pray for us.
St Joesph, Pillar of Families, Pray for us.
Viva Cristo Rey
Greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world. 1 John 4:4b
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