by Rt. Rev Abbot Michael-John OSB
House of Initia Nova – OSB
WE START WHERE SAINT BENEDICT would have started when writing about pride or lack of humility, and that is with Holy Scripture. How can we come to know ourselves without knowing what God has already said?
Scripture and Pride – what does it say?
- When pride comes, then comes disgrace,
but with humility comes wisdom.
- To fear the Lord is to hate evil;
I hate pride and arrogance,
evil behavior and perverse speech.
- Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.
- Before a downfall the heart is haughty,
but humility comes before honor.
- He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”
- For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.
- Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and exalt and glorify the King of heaven, because everything he does is right and all his ways are just. And those who walk in pride he is able to humble.
- If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
- Believers in humble circumstances ought to take pride in their high position. But the rich should take pride in their humiliation—since they will pass away like a wild flower.
Quotes regarding Pride
It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.
Author: Augustine
God is not proud. He will have us even though we have shown that we prefer everything else to Him.
Author: C.S. Lewis
A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.
Author: Henry Ward Beecher
It could be a sign of pride in your life if a word of reproof or admonition is not able to be received with the same grace, whether it be given by the poorest of saints or the most educated person.
Author: John Bunyan
Pride thrust Nebuchadnezzar out of men’s society, Saul out of his kingdom, Adam out of paradise, Haman out of court, and Lucifer out of heaven.
Author: Thomas Adams
Often Satan injects pride into the believer’s spirit, evoking in him an attitude of self-importance and of self-conceit. He causes him to esteem himself a very outstanding person, one who is indispensable in God’s work. Such a spirit constitutes one of the major reasons for the fall of believers.
Author: Watchman Nee
You can have no greater sign of confirmed pride than when you think you are humble enough.
Author: William Law
To attempt to pay for salvation with church membership, prayers, or good deeds is an insult to Christ, who paid the full price–and is a rejection of the gift of God’s grace.
Author: Dave Hunt
A proud faith is as much a contradiction as a humble devil.
Author: Stephen Charnock
God can never entrust His Kingdom to anyone who has not been broken of pride, for pride is the armor of darkness itself.
Author: Francis Frangipane
Pride comes from not knowing yourself and the world. The older you grow, and the more you see, the less reason you will find for being proud. Ignorance and inexperience are the pedestal of pride; once the pedestal is removed – pride will soon come down.
Author: J.C. Ryle
Let us watch against pride in every shape – pride of intellect, pride of wealth, pride in our own goodness, pride in our own deserts. Nothing is so likely to keep a man out of heaven, and prevent him seeing Christ, as pride. So long as we think we are something, we shall never be saved.
Author: J.C. Ryle
The chief occupational hazard of leadership is pride.
Author: John Stott
There is no greater punishment than that of being abandoned to one’s self.
– Pasquier Quesnel
Author: Assorted Authors
Often Satan injects pride into the believer’s spirit, evoking in him an attitude of self-importance and of self-conceit. He causes him to esteem himself a very outstanding person, one who is indispensable in God’s work. Such a spirit constitutes one of the major reasons for the fall of believers.
Author: Watchman Nee
Pride springs from desire. Man aspires to obtain a place for himself that he may feel honored before men. He loves to hear praising voices and considers them just and true. He also attempts to elevate himself in his work, whether in preaching or in writing, for his secret self-motive goads him on. In a word, this one has not yet died to his desire of vainglory. He is still seeking what he desires and what can inflate him.
Author: Watchman Nee
You can have no greater sign of confirmed pride than when you think you are humble enough.
Author: William Law
Pride builds walls between people, humility builds bridges.
Author: Rick Warren
Pride is a barrier to all spiritual progress.
Author: Harry Ironside
Whatever makes us feel superior to other people, whatever tempts us to convey a sense of superiority, that is the gravity of our sinful nature, not grace.
Author: Philip Yancey
God can never entrust His Kingdom to anyone who has not been broken of pride, for pride is the armor of darkness itself.
Author: Francis Frangipane
12 Steps of Pride and Its Antidote
Step 1 – Pride says: “It is what it is”: I am the master of my own harbor and the captain of my own ship.
Humility says: Humility is the beginning place of conversion. The first step of humility is keeping the fear of God always before ones’ eyes and never forgetting it.
Chapter 7 – Spiritual meaning – On calling upon Scripture as Benedict’s authority, he makes the point that humility is essential to our salvation. These are not just his words but the words of God, and we need to take them seriously. Benedict sees that pride is at the center of all sin, because pride is about my will versus the will of God. Pride separated the first family from the promise of Eden, and we through pride shut ourselves off from the growth that could be ours.
The challenge of pride is this: Whose pride is it? In many cases it is insidious, it makes itself out to be something else, and when we recognize it, it is all too late, it has done its damage. Pride falls into two general camps: holy pride, glory that is given and directed to God, and self-pride, which is given and directed to the self. Even with this definition, it is hard to tell which is which when we see our self as co-god.
I have spoken in the past how we can tell if pride is active in our lives. The questions are: Is the action/deed/word directed toward love, or is it directed to self? The question continues: Is what we are doing building another person up, or is it building our self up? Is our action and ultimate goal directed to God or to self? And, maybe the most revealing, where pride lies hidden and active….have we not asked these questions at all, but acted spontaneously, without thought or consideration of the other? You can bet that pride in one of its forms is at work.
Benedict quotes from Ps 131:2 – If I had not a humble spirit, but were exalted instead, then you would treat me like a weaned child on its mother’s lap. For those of us who have found exaltation from time to time, we are still on our mother’s lap – that is God’s. He/she is still holding us close. It is because of our action that we have forced ourselves away from the milk that is close by. It is not God’s intention to not feed us; we have decided that we are too old to be breast-feed, a mistake that comes too often in our life: meals that are not age-appropriate often have a way of coming back on us.
Benedict uses the image of a ladder that is planted on earth. Notice that it is not hung from heaven. We need to do the legwork of body and soul. For each spiritual virtue gained comes with an opposite work on the body. Example, in the first step of humility, we are to keep the fear of God always before our eyes. This is the spiritual virtue we want to attain. To obtain it, we need to keep our eyes away from those things that would give our mind and heart reason not to keep our eyes on God.
Application — Be open to the opportunities to love. Love is always about the other person, never our self. Love is about humility and not about self-want, self-will, self-anything. Be not deceived; Chapter 7 is about hard work, about letting go of old tapes that are still playing, about setting aside the definitions that society has trained us on; that I am everything, I am the center of my own world and that of others.
Spiritual meaning – Chapter 5 and Chapter 7 are intimately linked. Under Chapter 5 – Obedience (which we know as a response to love), Benedict writes: The first step of humility is unhesitating obedience, which comes naturally to those who cherish Christ above all. This is coupled with Chapter 7 when Benedict writes: The first step of humility, then is that a man keeps the fear (love) of God always before his eyes. The idea of unhesitating action joined to keeping God always before us sets the stage for daily living. This is important to Benedict. Obedience (love) cannot be half-hearted, for if it is, we will not be able to keep God before our eyes. If we are not able to keep God before our eyes, then something else will become our god and ultimately lead us down the path to destruction. It may take a while, and we may call it good, but these are just an illusion, something pretending to be real.
Benedict makes it clear in v. 12 that humility, obedience, and love are not a piecemeal approach to living an authentic life in Christ; our effort must be complete and be fully integrated — our whole body. He writes: The monastic guards himself at every moment from sins and vices of thought or tongue, of hand or foot, of self-will or bodily desire. Benedict understands that our living must not be solely an intellectual exercise. Every part of the body has something to contribute, something to say to the whole, and often it speaks to the more basic instincts of the body. It is also important to say that by design our body is meant to experience joy, laughter, and pleasure. Benedict isn’t suggesting that the body is evil by design, for God created it in God’s image. But unfortunately, since the Fall, not all desires lead to Christ, and we must be aware that there are worldly and supernatural forces that would have us take our eyes off of Christ and place them on something else…..leading us to distraction, separation, isolation, and self-absorption.
Finally, beginning with v. 19, Benedict reminds us not to follow our own will. “Will” by design was and is a good thing. Will gives us a context out of which we live out our lives. We say in the Lord’s Prayer, your will be done. This is said because more often than not, our will no longer reflects the heart of God, which is love. All we have to do is listen to the radio, watch a little TV, go to movie, pick up a magazine, and there we will see how far we have moved from the will of God. God’s will is about integration, bringing the whole of our intentions into his, being consumed by love itself. How much of what we see and do is directed to ourselves, and how much of what we do is directed to God? Benedict understood this and makes it very clear early in the Rule that we need balance and balances so that we do not fall from the scales of God’s divine love.
It must also be said that we cannot do this by ourselves. The will, our minds, our intellect, our ability to reason will more often than not rationalize what we want to do. In the Lord’s Prayer, we ask that God provide us our daily bread (the necessities of life). Daily bread is more than a meal; it also includes spiritual strength, spiritual wisdom, and the ability to discern what truly is the will of God.
Application — Be open to the words of our holy Father Benedict, to Holy Scripture and the Rule. Understand that our desire for holy living comes with a lot of work and it begins with loving God with all of our being (body, mind, soul) and the way of not driving off the cliff is by staying on the road, keeping our heart and eyes always on God.
Step 2 — Pride says: I know best what is good for me, for I am my closest friend.
Humility says: The second step of humility is that a person loves not their own will but imitates our Lord’s example by saying: “I have come not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.”
Benedict rehearses for us, in the second step to humility, that we should not love our own will, nor take pleasure in our willfulness. Humility is not about the suppression of the individual or his identity. Rather the opposite. Humility permits us to see ourselves for the first time without shadows, without pretense, without our masks. Humility frees us to be all we can be, as originally envisioned. We are laid bare before God and our brothers and sisters, as they are. Our true identity is revealed; it is an epiphany moment when I see myself (maybe) for the first time as God’s beloved, a person created just a little lower than the angels, heirs to God’s love and his fortunes, sons and daughters of a New Jerusalem, where the constraints of this physical world are set aside and the true intent for being is fully realized.
Step 3 – Pride says: I submit to no one but myself; servitude is practiced by fools and the impoverished.
Humility says: The third step of humility is submitting yourself to the Superior in all obedience for the love of God, imitating the Lord of whom the Apostle says: “He became obedient even to death.” (Phil 2:8.)
Spiritual meaning — Spiritual truth is often thought of as something that is hidden, and in some cases this is true. Just as the person who during his work found a rare and priceless pearl. He goes and sells all that he has and purchases it, now he has the pearl/truth and it is his to discover the inner truth/mystery of God’s plan and love.
In vv. 23–34, there isn’t a whole lot of mystery or truth that isn’t already laid out for all the world to read and see. God knows, and knows what he knows, the central truth is that God’s knowing is about love and the desire for us to have a life that is consistent with love. His love is not about waiting to bounce as an animal would on his prey, but a love that is patient and long-suffering. We hear this in v. 30. His presence in our life is not about bean-counting but about taking our beans and transforming them into something that is healthy and nurturing. But for this to happen, we must be willing to let go of our beans. Whatever our beans are — lust, greed, gluttony, envy, self-centeredness, gratification of our base nature at the expense of another — whatever they are, God is patiently waiting for us to hand them over.
To do this, we must keep God in our mind and before our eyes. As stated earlier in the Rule, we are to love God with all our heart, mind, body, soul, and strength. For us to be in a constant state of love, God must always be on the front burner of our mind. All our thoughts, words, deeds, actions are to be filtered through God’s love and our love back to him. Not to do this disables God’s want to love and our desire to love back. This does not mean that God’s love is not at the door of our heart — it is. But we need to open the door to Our Beloved so that we might become one with him.
The third step of humility is gained when we willingly give our obedience to the superior out of love for God. Humility comes with a cost factor. We give obedience, so that we might know what true love is. Obedience is sacrificial, love is sacrificial, it is a form of emptying ourselves so that we might be filled again with love. Love that is given away is never lost. In fact, it never left, only expanded as true love does. Its nature is to always want to become more and expand its borders. Humility is about obedience, obedience is about love, an obedience that is returned many times over, for those whose love is freely given, without grumbling, without hesitation.
Application — Be open to love that generates humility. Love, obedience, and humility (in its many forms, nurtured with the Tools of Good Works) is a seamless garment. One cannot have one without the others.
Spiritual meaning — By referencing v. 34, the third step of humility — that a man submits to his superior in all obedience for the love of God — he establishes a context out of which we love, obey, and submit in all humility. It is because of love that we endure all things and not run away from the experience. Benedict knows that our experiences (even though difficult) have something to teach us, to run means that I may lose the opportunity to learn something very valuable. Here, the concept of stability is raised. Staying put in the midst of the storm often brings more security than trying to outrun the storm. Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Iowa are known for their tornadoes. When caught unexpectedly in a storm, it is best to find the lowest spot, hunker down, and stay put. To try to outrun the storm leaves us vulnerable to flying objects and worse.
In the same v. 34, our obedience/love is given to the superior out of love for God. This does not make a whole lot of sense in this world because we have defined love based on our own experience and the teaching of society. Love today evaporates like morning dew in the hot sun. If I don’t get what I want, when I want it….I’m leaving. To facilitate the process, some states have what they call no-fault divorce, or divorces that are not contested. There is no such thing as no fault — two people were involved. There is usually enough fault to go around for all concerned. Rather, it is God’s love that we are mirroring and is being shown to the Abbot, right or wrong. It was Jesus’ love for his Father, that he stayed the course, while being wronged by the church, the people, and government. Love pushes on even when times get hard; it doesn’t run from the difficulty, it runs into the difficulty and embraces it, looking for the lesson that is within.
Finally, a sentence or two about the Abbot screwing up. It happens! They are human like anyone else. I pray that it isn’t often and when it does, that humility will bring the Abbot to his knees and ask forgiveness of the community and God. If not, wait patiently; God will take of it on judgment day.
Application — Be open to the love of God that will strengthen us for the journey. Religious life, Christian living, is not easy; it costs something. Be open to the lessons that are hidden in the darkness, and pray for light that they might germinate. Be patient as Christ is patient with us and pray for a humble spirit and a gentle heart.
Step 4 – Pride says: My goal is to make my life as easy and carefree as possible.
Humility says: The fourth step of humility is that in this obedience even under difficult times, all challenges should be embraced and endured without weakening or seeking release from them.
God wants us to be strong, and strength often comes with testing. Metals are made pure when the alloys are removed. They are strengthened when certain metals are added. This is true with us. Tribulation brings endurance, testing brings patience, staying put (stability) brings hope, and when God’s love is added, we are made stronger for our journey. This is all true if we trust in God’s love and give the challenges that are before us a chance to grow us.
Challenges also promotes generosity and charity. As we turn our gaze toward God, his love is reflected upon us. Love has a way of generating more love, and if more love, more generosity. So we are able to turn the cheek when struck, we are able to give the robber our winter coat when he has stolen our shirt; we are able to walk with someone not only the distance they ask (metaphorical language) and exceed their expectation. When we move beyond ourselves and let God transform the events that challenge us, we become transfigured in ways that allow others to see God through us.
Step 5 – Pride says: My thoughts are my thoughts, no one need to know my thoughts outside myself.
Humility says: The fifth step of humility is not to conceal from the Superior any sinful thoughts but confess them humbly.
Literal meaning – The 5th step of Humility is that a monastic does not conceal from the Abbot any sinful thoughts and any wrongs committed in secret. The 6th step of Humility is that a Monastic is content with the lowest and most menial treatment. The 7th step of Humility is that a monastic only admits with his tongue but is convinced in his heart that he is inferior to all and of less value. The 8th step of Humility is that a monastic does only what the common Rule of the Community requires and follows the good examples of those placed over them.
Spiritual meaning — It seems that the steps to humility are growing more personal. Let’s review them thus far:
1 – That a Christian/monastic keeps the fear/love of God always before our eyes
2 – That a Christian/monastic desires the will of God over his own
3 – That a Christian/monastic submits himself out of love to his boss/Abbot
4 – That a Christian/monastic not run away from the lessons that come during difficult times
5 – That a Christian/monastic does not hid from his priest/Abbot sins that separate him from God and community
6 – That a Christian/monastic sees opportunity of service in all he does and does not look for treatment or acknowledgment that might give rise to pride
7 – That a Christian/monastic takes the opportunity to always put another person first
8 – That Christians/monastics live lives that are authentic, keep the vows/promises they have made
A couple of notes before I comment on the Spiritual meaning of the steps listed between 44-55.
** If we understand obedience as an act of the law rather than love, we will certainly miss the point of these steps.
** Humility is not a virtue, practice, or an act that one does, but rather, a result of putting these steps into practice. If I may use a metaphor: the brightness of the sun is the result of work that has gone on at the surface of the sun. The light we see, sense, or feel is not the same as the chemical reactions that brought the light. So it is with humility….authentic humility comes from hard work. Anything less will be seen for what it is…….a fake and can’t be sustained for any length of time.
The 5th step of Humility is not concealing any sinful thought or wrongdoing from the Abbot. The central truth to this step is that sin has the capacity to separate us from the love of God and our neighbor. Sharing it with someone else dampens the progression of harmful thoughts.
Using my own words:
1 – Recognition — a mental awareness that a thought has entered the mind
2 – Embodiment — giving the thought form, feeling
3 – Rationalization — giving reason for embracing the thought
4 – No vacancy — the thought keeps returning stronger than it was before
5 – Transformation — consenting to become different than I am at this moment
6 – Passion — repetitive behavior that holds us captive
Confession for Benedict breaks the chain of events before getting to stage 3 – rationalization. Once we reach stage 3, it is hard to convince ourselves that our reasoning is undependable. This is spoken of in Chapter 4 v. 50 – As soon as wrongful thoughts come into your heart, dash them against Christ and disclose them to your spiritual father. It has been said that confession is good for the soul. And in this case, not to confess your sins endangers the soul.
Step 6 – Pride says: What! That work belongs to those making minimum wage.
Humility says: The sixth step of humility is being content with the lowest and most menial work.
The 6th step of Humility is that a monk is content with the lowest and most menial treatment and regards himself as a poor and worthless workman. This rubs against the grain of society and what it has taught us. Notice that Benedict uses the content – at peace where he finds himself. Contentment is not about happiness or joy – for these sentiments or feels come and go based on the latest event. Contentment is about staying the course and speaks to the idea of stability. True joy which is in Christ is understood as one who serves and finds quietude as he moves away from self and ministers to those who are truly in need. It is through this serves the step 6 acts as a tool to (again) break the chain of events that lead us to unhappiness and sorrow.
Step 7 – Pride says: I have worked hard to get where I am. Look at all the certificates on my wall. I bow my head to no one.
Humility says: The seventh step of humility is to admit with one’s tongue and be convinced in one’s heart that they are the least of all, humbling themselves before their peers.
Step 7th of Humility builds on number 6. Number 7 is an incarnational statement about how we see and understand ourselves. Christ, who was superior in every way to man, fully God, took upon himself the inferior — the fallen human condition, humbling himself so that he might serve and in perfect unity with the will of the Father, able to reclaim their creation. So in humbling ourselves, God exalts us, calling us friends and not slaves, making us heirs to the kingdom and calling us his Beloved.
Step 8 – Pride says: I need no rule of life, I am the center of my universe, I determine what is appropriate for me.
Humility says: The eighth step of humility is to do only what is endorsed by the Rule and Customary, as set by the Superior and Chapter.
And finally, step 8 of Humility is about community and what it means to live in community. We are not an island to ourselves, we are interconnected, following a rule of life that has sustained Christian living and monastic life for over 1,500 years.
Application — Listen with the ear of your heart and be open to the counter-cultural lessons that will ultimately bring us to salvation.
Step 9 – Pride says: Everyone wants and needs to hear what I have to say, for in my flow of words, I am best known for my intellect.
Humility says: The ninth step of humility is controlling one’s need to talk obsessively.
Spiritual meaning — The 9th Step of Humility – Scripture and Benedict are asking us to be considerate of ourselves and for those around us by keep watch over our lips and thinking first before we utter a word. Benedict isn’t against communication, for this is how the Teacher teaches his students. And he isn’t against the student speaking but suggests strongly that we wait with patience, listening with the ear of our heart before speaking, so that all may hear and be edified by what is being said.
There is something to be said about giving us the room we need to reflect on the deeper meaning of God and life. Too often I have heard things come from people’s lips that should have never been said. I have often thought about returning to the old way of monastic life where monastics are to be seen and not heard unless asked to speak. But, to force this demand on everyone would be like throwing water on embers of a dying fire…..it would put out everything, throwing the baby out with the bath-water. So, I simply call on everyone to hear the spiritual truth in this step and watch, listen and curb the amount of our speech, using it as a gift in which everyone is edified.
Step 10 – Pride says: My world is my oyster, and I will say what I want, when I want, regardless of the implications.
Humility says: The tenth step of humility is the use of good judgment when tempted to raise one’s voice in inappropriate ways.
The 10th Step of Humility is related to laughter. Let me very clear, laughter is pleasing to God and to humankind when it is practiced with a certain amount of restraint. Benedict’s message about laughter is directed to the context from which the laughter is derived. Unfortunately, Benedict knew that even monks had bad days and were not unlike the laity and clergy about being caught up in a joke or conversation that turned south and came as some expense of another person. Benedict says be thoughtful, be compassionate, be charitable for it may well be your turn next.
Step 11 – Pride says: Just ask my congregation, they will tell you I am full of myself and willing to share that every Sunday.
Humility says: The eleventh step of humility is that a person use discretion when speaking, for it is written: “A wise person is known by their few words.”
The 11th Step of Humility is about decorum, how we should handle ourselves before God and our neighbor. Too often I think that we are more of this world than the one that is in the process of becoming. Too often our loud uproars, our need to be speaking constantly, the lack of reason or focus, the need to use four-letter words to gain attention, says more about us than what was said. So, God and Benedict ask us to speak not out of our own self-centeredness but out of consideration for those who might be pulled into an unfortunate conversation.
Step 12 – Pride says: Humility belongs to the hopeless and downtrodden but not to me. Look at what I have accomplished.
Humility says: The last step is keeping the previous 11 steps of humility in my heart and mind, for the Psalms say: “I am bowed down and humbled in every way.”
The 12th Step of Humility is about manifesting humility. Remember that humility is not something that is practiced or a virtue. Rather, it is the result of hard work using the tools of good works, and risers that allow us to move up and down the ladder of perfection. Even the success of one of the Steps of Humility will convey some aura of humility. It is our challenge to incorporate all of the steps of humility into our lives. Having done that, we will quickly arrive at that perfect love of God which casts out all fear.
Application — The Steps of Humility cannot be accomplished on our own, for we are too full of ourselves, too weak, too frail. As Benedict stated earlier in the Rule, we must begin each task with prayer, asking God to strengthen us for the journey, provide us that place where we can be open to the changes that are coming and ultimately aspire to the wholeness that can be ours if we don’t run away.