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The 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
I had a visit on the phone last week with our retired archbishop, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen. It was his 89th birthday, a good day to visit and catch up with an old friend. For the benefit of newcomers to Seattle, Archbishop Hunthausen is the “Raymond” I always include in the Eucharistic prayer. He served as our archbishop for 16 years and lived a few more in retirement here at St. James. It was my privilege to work very closely with him during all those years and he gave me the greatest gift possible back in 1988 when he appointed me pastor of St. James Cathedral. Archbishop Hunthausen came to mind when I sat down to reflect on today’s scriptures. First, there was that verse from the Book of Sirach, “The greater you are, humble yourself the more;” and then there were the two familiar parables from Luke’s gospel: one about places of honor at a wedding banquet, the other about whom to invite when you’re entertaining. Humility is the thread that runs through those readings, so it’s no wonder I thought of Archbishop Hunthausen. Anyone who knows him knows that he is a humble man in the truest sense of the word. For me, he defines humility -- not the insincere, posturing which sometimes passes for humility; no, honest-to-God, down-to-earth humility that reflects its origins in the Latin word for earth, humus. A humble person is one who knows where he comes from: from the humble dust of the earth. And the humble person also knows where he is headed – headed for glory – not because of any personal accomplishments, but because of the wonders of God’s grace. In one of his homilies, the great St. Augustine spoke simply and compellingly about humility. “For those who would learn God’s ways,” he said, “humility is the first thing, humility is the second thing, humility is the third thing.” To that I would only add: how hard it is to learn God’s ways! Learning God’s ways means coming to the point where we have a clear perspective on the truth of who we are and the truth of who God is; letting go of our pretensions about our importance or our achievements, and acknowledging that any good we are able to do is really God’s doing – for the simple reason that any gifts we have are God’s gifts. That’s a far cry from those self-important people in the gospel parable who grabbed all the places of honor at table. But why shouldn’t they? They were only claiming their due. They were important, so important that it never crossed their minds that someone even more important might show up. How wrong they were; and how embarrassed they must have been. Of course, Jesus didn’t tell the parable to help people avoid embarrassment; he told it to teach a lesson about humility: don’t imagine yourself great or important because there will always be someone greater or more important. And, besides, any importance you may have achieved is not your doing, it’s God’s! Back to Archbishop Hunthausen. In May of 1975, just a day or two after he was installed as Archbishop, he came here to St. James to ordain some young men to the priesthood. Before the ordination, he was mixing with people out there near the chapel steps. Typical for him, he was dressed like a simple priest, without any of the fancy trappings of his office. One of the young men about to be ordained came by and the archbishop who had never met him recognized him and greeted him by name. The young man didn’t have a clue who was talking to him and asked him who he was. “I’m Bishop Hunthausen,” he said with a disarming smile. A far cry from a bishop I once heard of who, whenever someone failed to recognize him or pay him due deference, would be heard to say, “Does he know who I am?” The sad thing is that a person like that doesn’t really know who he is. Humility is truth, after all, and the path to humility is knowing and embracing the truth about ourselves -- not about our role, but about ourselves. We can be humble only when we know and gratefully accept who we are and who God is. The second little parable in today’s gospel follows nicely from the first. One good way to learn humility is to hang out with the humble – to invite into our company once in awhile the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, the off-casts – to sit with them at table and dine with them. It’s a rather scary, uncomfortable thought, isn’t it? But we have the perfect model for it. Isn’t this exactly what Jesus does with us every time we come to the table of the Eucharist? For aren’t we, in his eyes, the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, the off-casts? He who humbled himself to become one of us continues to humble himself as he welcomes us to his table and takes delight in being in our company! Father Michael G. Ryan |
