307. Sixteenth Monday of Ordinary Time

Meditations no. 285 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

Christ seeks only the glory of God, without ostentation.

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.”

Despite having seen Jesus work many miracles, the Pharisees still did not believe in him, because they lacked humility and simplicity. They asked for a sign, in order to put him to the test. This approach is in stark contrast to Christ’s own attitude. Throughout the pages of the Gospel one can see his constant desire not to seek the limelight, not to be the centre of attention. He seeks only the glory of God and the good of souls. He does not covet human glory, either for himself or for the mission his Father entrusted to him. That is why he avoids all unnecessary ostentation.

We should learn from Jesus’ attitude in these trials. During his life on earth he did not even want the glory that belonged to him. Though he had the right to be treated as God, he took the form of a servant, a slave. And so the Christian knows that all glory is due to God and that he must not make use of the sublimity and greatness of the Gospel to further his own interests or human ambitions.

Throughout most of his life Christ kept silent and confined himself to action, to doing things. He chose this as the best way to behave, on many occasions. The early Christians followed his example. It is better, St Ignatius of Antioch wrote, to be a Christian than to say one is a Christian. It is a very good thing to teach, provided one practises what one teaches. We have only one Teacher - he who spoke, and all things were made. The things that he has done in silence are worthy of the Father. If you understand the word spoken by Jesus, you can understand his silence. And then you will be perfect, because you will act in accordance with your word and will manifest yourself by your silence.

That is what our life has to be: a service rendered to God, without any show, avoiding any merely human motivation, and not seeking praise from others. When one works wholly and exclusively for the glory of God one does everything with naturalness, like someone who is in a hurry and will not be delayed by “making a great show of things”. In this way one does not lose the unique and incomparable company of the Lord.

God does not want the Work to seek its own glory. Reasons for collective humility.

Christ wishes us to imitate him in his hidden life. In dedicating ourselves to the service of God the sole desire to give all glory to God leads us to serve the Church and all souls, without seeking any glory for the Work or any personal benefit. We only want to serve God, and we try to put into practice what St Paul proposes: Vita vestra est abscondita cum Christo in Deo. (Your life is hid with Christ in God. ) What God thinks, not what other people think, is what matters. That has always been, and will always be, the ambition of the Work: to live without human glory. And don’t forget, our Father goes on to say, that, at the start, my initial idea was that the Work shouldn’t even have a name, so that only God would know about it But since we hate secrecy and always work within the laws of each country, we had to have a name.

The collective humility which is characteristic of the Work is the fruit of an ardent desire to give all glory to God and not to seek any praise for the work we do. This holy desire to see the Work pass unnoticed has nothing to do with secrecy. I hate secrecy, our Founder said, it often serves only to do evil, or to lessen people’s responsibility. The only secrecy I want is the secrecy of the confessional. And that is what I say to anyone who comes to me wanting to tell me a secret.

From the early years of the Work our Father taught us this way of acting. Later, thanks to God’s grace, as the spectacular growth of our apostolic activities made clear the maturity of the Work, it still remained necessary for us to carry out our work without any noise or fuss. What our Lord asks of us is naturalness. If we are ordinary Christians, dedicated to God in the world - in the world and of the world, but not worldly - we cannot behave in any other way.

As souls dedicated to the service of God, we have to take very much to heart our Lord’s words: Beware of practising your piety before men in order to be seen by them; for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.

The theological virtue of hope gives us such great regard for the reward our Father God has promised us, that we don’t wish to risk losing it through a lack of collective humility. We don’t wish to have applied to us, for having sought the applause of men, those words of our Lord: Amen dico vobis, quia receperunt mercedem suam: they have already received their reward. A sad business!

That’s why we don’t want people to praise us or give us public recognition. We want to work silently and humbly, with interior joy: servite Domino in laetitia (serve the Lord with gladness), with apostolic ardour that doesn’t fade, precisely because it doesn’t try to show off or do anything spectacular. We want there to be, in all professions and walks of life, select groups of men and women who, without waving flags or wearing badges, live holy lives and influence their companions, and society at large, for the welfare of souls. That is the only ambition the Work has.

Collective humility based on personal humility.

I have always taught you, our Father has written, that collective humility is a fundamental aspect of our spirituality. If John and Peter and Andrew, taken individually, are supposed to be humble, I can’t see why together they should have the right to be as proud as peacocks.

Collective humility is rooted in personal humility and draws its strength from the truth of self-knowledge. We are instruments in God’s hands, and it is God who works wonders. That is why we avoid all applause and praise, both personally and collectively. The sight of the marvels God works through us should help us to be humble, to praise God, and acknowledge that everything comes from him. All we have done is to get in the way or, at best, to act just as poor instruments in his hands.

We should realize that many others have worked much better than any of us, have sacrificed themselves more, and prayed more perseveringly. But often our Lord has used you and me more than those people, so that it can be seen that he is the one who does things, and that the instruments don’t matter, or matter very little.

Because God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong, God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

It is good to acknowledge the marvels God does through us; but we cannot, even for a moment, entertain any thought of pride because of any service we have rendered to God; for in that very moment we would cease to be supernaturally effective. On the contrary, our Father tells us, you should work naturally, without any show, without trying to attract people’s attention. You should go unnoticed, like a good father looking after the upbringing of his children, or a person who gives good advice to a friend, full of Christian good sense, or an employer who sees to it that those working for him are well looked after, both spiritually and materially.

You should therefore work silently, but without any mystery or secrecy, which, incidentally, we have never had any use for, and never will have, because God has no use for them either; and besides, decent upright people find them quite off-putting anyway. So work away quietly, with such deep personal humility that it will lead you necessarily to practise collective humility, not to want to receive individually the esteem and appreciation which are due to the Work of God and to the holy lives of your brothers and sisters.

We have to go unnoticed, with personal humility which gives rise naturally to collective humility. And to achieve that, we want to work like three thousand, while only making the noise of three. This approach defends the spirit of humility which God wants to be characteristic of the Work as a whole, and not just of its individual members. At the same time it contributes to the effectiveness of the apostolate of good example which each of us carries out in our own family, work and social situation.

Let us end our prayer today contemplating our Lady. The humility of my Mother Holy Mary! -You won’t see her amid the palms of Jerusalem, nor, apart from the first-fruits of Cana, at the hour of the great miracles.

-But she doesn’t flee from the contempt of Golgotha; there, iuxta crucem Iesu, beside the cross of Jesus, stands his Mother.