Saturday – 30th Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel – Luke14:1, 7-11

Humble Pie

Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem

Remember that school assembly when you were convinced you were getting a special award/recognition?  Remember how much you ‘knew’ you deserved it?  And remember when someone else got the honor and not you?  Were you happy for the other student?  Did you congratulate them?  Or did you skulk away with a scowl on your face and a foul mood in your heart?

We live in a very narcissistic, selfish ME society these days!  We see it on the news, in ads, in movies and in so many random interactions at the store or in line for food.  There is this singular drive to be #1 – to be the best teacher, athlete, politician, to have the most power or possessions, the biggest house and the most adulation, to have less wrinkles and more money!  And apparently it is all at the expense of others; it doesn’t matter who I have to step on or use to get there.  It’s all about ME!  And it’s all about I DESERVE THIS!

We see it in today’s parable!  Someone so full of himself thinks he deserves the place of honor at a wedding banquet, the best seat in the house where all can see how important and special he is!  And then the humiliation when someone more important arrives and he is relegated to a table in the back of the room!  How embarrassing when we let our pride and self-importance get in the way!

What’s missing here?  The virtue of humility!  The realization that I should put the needs of others above my own!  That we are called to serve others, not to be served!  It takes us back to the Last Supper where Jesus puts on the towel of a servant and proceeds to wash the feet of the Apostles and then challenges them to make that their mission – to serve God and to serve others, to make others’ needs more important than our own.

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