Lent: Day Eight

When I was a young child, my mother said two things to me that offended me: The first was she told me that she thought the Beatles never should have made any films because they were musicians, not actors; the second was that she told me that life isn’t fair. I disagreed with the Beatles comment until I saw Magical Mystery Tour and Yellow Submarine, and I resented the idea that life isn’t fair"because it’s not fair that life isn’t fair!

For the most part, I’m glad life isn’t fair. The unfairness of life has worked for me more than against me. But I only seem to have a problem with it when I feel I am on the losing end of the deal. I don’t mind that life isn’t fair when it is working to my advantage. But there are times when it works against me and I hate it. And it doesn’t matter that it was unfair in my favor a hundred times compared to the one time it was unfair against me, when it works against me, I loudly and confidently declare that life sucks!

And frankly, there are times when life does suck. It sucks that people have brain tumors and illnesses. It sucks that there is violence and war and crime and injustice. It sucks that right now, at this very second, someone, somewhere is being told by a doctor that they are going to die and there’s nothing that can be done about it. It’s unfair and it sucks"and accepting that sometimes life sucks is the essence of St. Benedict’s fourth step to humility, which is:

ACCEPT EVEN HARD AND DISTASTEFUL THINGS.

Some people call this “Living life on life’s terms.” Others simply call this acceptance. But the point is, if we live in this world, we are going to face people and things and situations that suck. Often, it seems that the hardest thing we can do in this world is live in it. There is much about this world that I don’t like. There is much about humanity that I don’t like. I am often frustrated by the short-sightedness of greed, which destroys lives and rapes our planet, just so someone somewhere can make a profit. That, to me, is hard and distasteful.

I know that even though humility is telling me I must accept these hard and distasteful things"like greed, death, pain, poverty, illness, loneliness, violence, injustice, apathy"my acceptance does not mean that I have to condone them, or decide that nothing can be done. Just because I cannot change it now, doesn’t mean that it cannot be changed"at least in terms of societal issues. I still think that people of faith are to strive to live in the world as it should be, regardless of how it is, to show the world what it could be. So I can accept that violence is real, and that I will probably be on the receiving end of it many times in my life, but it doesn’t mean that I have to accept violence as something that should be emulated just because it is prevalent. I accept the reality of violence, but I don’t have to employ violence, even when I am on the receiving end of violence. I accept it, but I do not condone it, and I will not be it’s agent.

So this step of humility isn’t about accepting a role as a victim. Humility is not humiliation! But whatever my role, it must be grounded in the here and now, in the life that is"the life that is not fair. But just because I pray to accept the things I cannot change, it doesn’t mean that I have to accept what can be changed. So it is clear that in order to accept what is hard and distasteful"the things that suck that I cannot change"I need wisdom to know that they cannot be changed; just as I need wisdom to know that I don’t have to accept things that suck that can be changed.

I doubt that any of this is making sense, so I guess I’ll say this:

 I have to live the life as I have it, not the life as I want but don’t have, because if I ignore the life I have while yearning for the life I don’t have, then I have no life at all. So I have to learn to accept my life"the good and the bad, the advantages and the disadvantages, the rough and the smooth, the appetizing and the distasteful, the easy and the hard. I accept all of who I am, and all of what I am, and all of what I have"I accept all that my life is.

So, it seems, a component of humility is patience"or as it is translated in the Bible: “endurance,” which is a patient endurance. “Whomever patiently endures to the end will be saved” the Lord tells me in Matthew’s Gospel (10:22). Another component of humility is courage because it takes courage to be patient in distasteful circumstances. It is a courageous thing to accept life as it is without growing weary and losing faith. Just as I am told over and over to patiently endure, I am also told in many places to “wait for the Lord.” So the third step toward humility may be “Courageously and Patiently Endure the Hard and Distasteful Things as much as You Accept and Embrace the Easy and Pleasing Things.”

Pride says, “I don’t deserve this!”; Humility says, “Deserve has nothing to do with it, his is the way it is.” Pride says, “This sucks!”; Humility says, “If this is the way, then this is the way I’ll go.” Pride says, “Why me?”; Humility says, “Why not me?” Pride says “When I get my way, I’ll be happy”; Humility says “Whether I get my way or not, I am free,” knowing that happiness lies in freedom, and freedom is found in God’s will.

My pride does not like adversity, and when I am faced with it, my instinct is to impose my will on it. My pride cannot accept injury, and when injured, my instinct is to attack and injure more. And it seems that what humility offers me is patience, teaching me to let God deal with my adversaries, regardless of who and what they are. My pride is impatient and wants to take matters into it’s own hands. It is only by humility that I can ever hope to keep the commandments of our Lord. My pride cannot endure being struck on the cheek without lashing out. It is humility that allows me, when struck, to turn the other cheek to the one who wounded me. My pride resents going the extra mile, especially when ordered to, or coerced. It is only humility that allows me to go two miles when forced to march one. And it is only humility that makes it possible for me to forgive, just as I have been forgiven because my pride wants to hold grudges, which to me, feels like power. It is only humility that allows me to bless those who curse me, pray for those who hate me, and forgive those who wrong me.     

If I can learn how not to play God; if I can learn to not be so in love with my own will; if I can learn to do what I’m told by God and others and learn how to obey my circumstances; then I can learn how to patiently and courageously endure all things, as long as I have to endure them.

I think for me, this step of humility is best summed up by the second part of the long form of the Serenity Prayer--the part that is rarely said after the famous "God grant me the serenity..." part. It goes like this:

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.

So when faced with hard and distasteful things, I will:

1) Never ask “Why me?” but answer “Why not me?”

2) Say: “If that’s the way, Lord, then that’s the way I’ll Go.”

3) Remind myself that what happens to me, or whatever people do to me, may not be God’s will, but my response is to be in keeping with God’s will"which is love.

Sometimes it's hard to quantify ideas. I would appreciate any suggestions.