Inbox Inspiration: December 22, 2021: Christmas - Humility

 December 22, 2021

 

 Christmas – Humility     

 

Dear Friends, 

Thirty-seven years ago, in 1983, I was part of a wonderful tour to the Holy Land. Among my many memories of that trip, I recall especially our visit to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. 

The doorway that you have to use to enter this church is only three feet high. The original full-size doorway was gradually lowered to this height to deter looters from entering with ease. That was done during one of the many periods of unrest and international battling over the Holy Land. At any rate, to enter the Church of the Nativity through this doorway, one must stoop and bow or even kneel. That is why this entrance is called the Door of Humility.  

 

This speaks to me in two ways.

First, the Son of God, Christ, humbled himself in taking on our humanity.

Saint Paul says this so beautifully: “Though he was in the form of God, [he] did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself… coming in human likeness; and…he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.”

So, passing through the Door of Humility, bending or kneeling, recalls the sheer humility of Christ, of Jesus, born in Bethlehem.  

 

And second, it also makes us aware of our own need for humility. We need to be humble to be open to the One who is beyond us, to admit our need for the transcendent, to own up to our human finiteness. One of our contemporary Catholic authors says it very well:

“For humility is the gateway to faith. Without it, we rely simply on our own efforts, without recognizing our dependence on God. Without it, we rely simply on our own reason, without opening ourselves up to the possibility of the miraculous. Without it, we cannot fully enter into the world that God has in store for us.”

The Door of Humility at the Church of the Nativity has much to say to us as we celebrate Christmas.  

 

Father Michael Schleupner

 

First quotation from the Letter to the Philippians 2:6-8.

Second quotation from Jesus: A Pilgrimage by James Martin, S.J.