Spiritual Formation by Insult
Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent – March 28, 2015
The brothers praised a monk before Abba Antony. When the monk came to see him, Antony wanted to know how he would bear insults; and seeing that he could not bear them at all, he said to him, “You are like a village magnificently decorated on the outside, but destroyed from within my robbers.”
[Benedicta Ward, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, p. 4]
Endurance for the Desert Christians invited reflection on what they believed about themselves. Were they able to bear up underneath insults and humiliations?
No one likes to be embarrassed, insulted, or humiliated. It is, well . . . embarrassing, insulting, and humiliating!!
But there are few things as helpful as embarrassments, insults, and humiliations to reveal to us what we truly believe about ourselves. They offend our sense of fairness and rightness, as we tell ourselves things like, “I don’t deserve this!”
We want to be seen as a particular kind of person, with certain qualities. We spend a great deal of time and energy (and money!) creating that image of ourselves, and then defending that image of ourselves. This is the image that our tradition calls the “false self,” the “ego self,” or the “manufactured self.” It may be what we believe about ourselves, and it likely includes what we want others to believe about us.
This false self is all about image and appearance, about what is on the outside. There is little substance and little actual reality with the false self.
Our spiritual tradition says that you can often get a glimpse of your own false self by looking at what embarrasses you, insults you, or humiliates you . . . for we become attached to aspects of ourselves, that get revealed when we go through one of these experiences. Antony says as much in the saying for today.
In effect, our reactions to embarrassment, insult, and humiliation probably says more about us than about the person who embarrasses, insults, or humiliates us.
This is also the reason that Saint Francis of Assisi prayed for one humiliation a day. Those experiences kept him humble, kept him from being puffed up or inflated with his own self-importance.
What we are able to bear on the outside says a lot about what resides within us inside.
The brothers praised a monk before Abba Antony. When the monk came to see him, Antony wanted to know how he would bear insults; and seeing that he could not bear them at all, he said to him, “You are like a village magnificently decorated on the outside, but destroyed from within my robbers.”
[Benedicta Ward, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, p. 4]
Endurance for the Desert Christians invited reflection on what they believed about themselves. Were they able to bear up underneath insults and humiliations?
No one likes to be embarrassed, insulted, or humiliated. It is, well . . . embarrassing, insulting, and humiliating!!
But there are few things as helpful as embarrassments, insults, and humiliations to reveal to us what we truly believe about ourselves. They offend our sense of fairness and rightness, as we tell ourselves things like, “I don’t deserve this!”
We want to be seen as a particular kind of person, with certain qualities. We spend a great deal of time and energy (and money!) creating that image of ourselves, and then defending that image of ourselves. This is the image that our tradition calls the “false self,” the “ego self,” or the “manufactured self.” It may be what we believe about ourselves, and it likely includes what we want others to believe about us.
This false self is all about image and appearance, about what is on the outside. There is little substance and little actual reality with the false self.
Our spiritual tradition says that you can often get a glimpse of your own false self by looking at what embarrasses you, insults you, or humiliates you . . . for we become attached to aspects of ourselves, that get revealed when we go through one of these experiences. Antony says as much in the saying for today.
In effect, our reactions to embarrassment, insult, and humiliation probably says more about us than about the person who embarrasses, insults, or humiliates us.
This is also the reason that Saint Francis of Assisi prayed for one humiliation a day. Those experiences kept him humble, kept him from being puffed up or inflated with his own self-importance.
What we are able to bear on the outside says a lot about what resides within us inside.
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