Is God humble? Connection between Humility and Love

[PetraG]

As is so often the case, I like the way C.S. Lewis explained it, using the character of the senior tempter, the demon Screwtape (this is from Letter 14 of The Screwtape Letters):

You must therefore conceal from the patient the true end of Humility. Let him think of it not as self-forgetfulness but as a certain kind of opinion (namely, a low opinion) of his own talents and character. Some talents, I gather, he really has. Fix in his mind the idea that humility consists in trying to believe those talents to be less valuable than he believes them to be. No doubt they are in fact less valuable than he believes, but that is not the point. The great thing is to make him value an opinion for some quality other than truth, thus introducing an element of dishonesty and make-believe into the heart of what otherwise threatens to become a virtue. By this method thousands of humans have been brought to think that humility means pretty women trying to believe they are ugly and clever men trying to believe they are fools. And since what they are trying to believe may, in some cases, be manifest nonsense, they cannot succeed in believing it and we have the chance of keeping their minds endlessly revolving on themselves in an effort to achieve the impossible. To anticipate the Enemy’s strategy, we must consider His aims. The Enemy wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the, fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour’s talents—or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long-term policy, I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self-love—a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours. For we must never forget what is the most repellent and inexplicable trait in our Enemy; He really loves the hairless bipeds He has created and always gives back to them with His right hand what He has taken away with His left.

cont

 

[PetraG]

His whole effort, therefore, will be to get the man’s mind off the subject of his own value altogether. He would rather the man thought himself a great architect or a great poet and then forgot about it, than that he should spend much time and pains trying to think himself a bad one. Your efforts to instil either vainglory or false modesty into the patient will therefore be met from the Enemy’s side with the obvious reminder that a man is not usually called upon to have an opinion of his own talents at all, since he can very well go on improving them to the best of his ability without deciding on his own precise niche in the temple of Fame. You must try to exclude this reminder from the patient’s consciousness at all costs. The Enemy will also try to render real in the patient’s mind a doctrine which they all profess but find it difficult to bring home to their feelings—the doctrine that they did not create themselves, that their talents were given them, and that they might as well be proud of the colour of their hair. But always and by all methods the Enemy’s aim will be to get the patient’s mind off such questions, and yours will be to fix it on them. Even of his sins the Enemy does not want him to think too much: once they are repented, the sooner the man turns his attention outward, the better the Enemy is pleased,

Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE

 

[HopkinsReb]

I think it’s moreso that contrition due to love reflects a more perfect understanding and interior disposition.

And, because I’m not 100% clear on your posts, the teaching is not (as I undertand it) that every contrition starts with fear and moves towards love, but that generally speaking people progress in their faith and trust over time.

I may well be quite mistaken because the deep study of this is new to me, but I think the Church defines “imperfect contrition” as contrition that arises from fear of punishment and “perfect contrition” as contrition that arises from a true love of and desire to be reconciled to God. I think the idea is that at first we apologize from fear of punishment, but as we grow in love of God and understanding of our relationship to Him, that our motivations change.

 

[fhansen]

fhansen:

To some extent we start with fear no matter what I think. And when scripture says that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, I think the message implies a healthy understanding of who He is relative to us, his creation. And this is still superior in its way to what is essentially its opposite, pride, which denies His very existence for all practical purposes, exalting itself above everything else as it seeks to do.

Either way I explained how the Christian message actually counters this concept of God which may be universal in us but that it can take time to get it straight. It’s not just a matter of how it’s been taught, but a matter of our own preconceptions that must be overcome.

Isn’t the Catholic view on contrition that it begins from the fear of punishment and, as one is sanctified, turns to the love of God?

I think you have it pretty close to the mark. Best to let the Church speak on it:

Contrition

1451 Among the penitent’s acts contrition occupies first place. Contrition is "sorrow of the soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the resolution not to sin again."50

1452 When it arises from a love by which God is loved above all else, contrition is called “perfect” (contrition of charity). Such contrition remits venial sins; it also obtains forgiveness of mortal sins if it includes the firm resolution to have recourse to sacramental confession as soon as possible.51

1453 The contrition called “imperfect” (or “attrition”) is also a gift of God, a prompting of the Holy Spirit. It is born of the consideration of sin’s ugliness or the fear of eternal damnation and the other penalties threatening the sinner (contrition of fear). Such a stirring of conscience can initiate an interior process which, under the prompting of grace, will be brought to completion by sacramental absolution. By itself however, imperfect contrition cannot obtain the forgiveness of grave sins, but it disposes one to obtain forgiveness in the sacrament of Penance.52

1454 The reception of this sacrament ought to be prepared for by an examination of conscience made in the light of the Word of God. The passages best suited to this can be found in the Ten Commandments, the moral catechesis of the Gospels and the apostolic Letters, such as the Sermon on the Mount and the apostolic teachings.53

 

[TheLittleLady]

God the Father does not have human emotions.

God the Son, when He became man, did experience human emotions and was meek and humble of heart.

God the Spirit does not have human emotions.