Detachment Helps Combat Pride and Sloth

In the previous articles, I discussed how to regulate the concupisciple and irascible appetites, and how to regulate the powers of the human soul. Now I turn our attention to combatting a cardinal sin that afflicts the soul and another which impairs the body.


Combating Pride Specifically

Pride is the inordinate love of our own excellence; it can apply to irascible appetites (e.g., pride in our physical strength) or in the will (e.g., intellectual or spiritual pride). Pride is a spiritual sin and is less debasing but more serious than those of the flesh. Pride is directly opposed to humility. Humility and magnanimity are connected virtues which complete and balance each other, whereas pride and pusillanimity are contradictory vices.

Pride may be manifested in many forms: curiosity, levity of mind, vanity, foolish and misplaced joy, boasting, singularity, arrogance, presumption, the refusal to recognize one’s errors, the concealing of one’s sins in confession, rebellion, and even the contempt of God. The principal defects springing from pride are presumption, ambition, and vainglory. 

The remedy for pride is to tell ourselves – and believe – that of ourselves we are nothing. We are dust and to dust our body shall return. We came from nothingness, and live in a world that came from nothingness. Were it not for the continual power of the Almighty and Good God sustaining creation, than each one of us and all created things, visible and invisible, would slip back into the oblivion of nothingness.

All we have comes from God Who works in us both to will and to accomplish. All good comes from God alone. The only thing I am truly responsible for are my own sins, because any real good I do, I can only do by cooperating with God’s grace. 

We may think ourselves more pious or less prone to sin and error than another, but we forget this is only on account of God’s grace. You should combat your pride by telling yourself – and believing – that if any other person had received the graces God has given you, then that person would be far holier than you.

But to reach humility we must receive a passive purification by the light of the gifts of the Holy Ghost. To suffer contradictions and trials can be a great aid toward developing humility. But it all must be based in true and honest humility (not false humility). Humility of Heart by Father Cajetan Mary da Bergamo is a great resource on this essential topic.

The Saints Always Combatted Pride

All the saints provide powerful lessons on how to combat pride. For while some saints may have been simple and others scholars, some noble and others common, some young and others old, every single saint had humility. One does not enter Heaven without perfecting this virtue. Here are just two examples for your consideration.

Butler’s Lives of the Saints relates the following regarding St. Francis Borgia, the third General Superior of the Jesuits. “Being once on a journey with F. Bustamanti, they lay all night together in a cottage upon straw, and F. Bustamanti, who was very old and asthmatical, coughed and spit all night; and, thinking that he spit upon the wall, frequently disgorged a great quantity of phlegm on [St. Francis’] face, which the saint never turned from him. Next morning F. Bustamanti, finding what he had done, was in great confusion, and begged his pardon. Francis answered: ‘You have no reason; for you could not have found a fouler place, or fitter to be spit upon.’”

Saint Philip Neri’s love for Jesus was so strong that his heart was physically enlarged to the point of cracking one of his ribs. He was so inflamed with the love of God that when he once gripped the grille separating a monastery’s enclosure, the iron rods began to melt. Nevertheless, every morning he would pray: “Oh Lord, leave me not; as otherwise I shall this day, like Judas betray you.” He had sufficient awareness of his true self that he knew it was within himself to abandon Christ and sin grievously. Would that we each offered this humble prayer daily. 

Combating Sloth Specifically

Sloth is a voluntary and culpable repugnance to work which is opposed to generosity. When this idleness affects one’s religious duties, it is called acedia. It is disgust for spiritual things, because they demand too much effort and self-discipline, opposed to devotion. Spiritual sloth is mortally sinful when it leads to neglecting duties necessary for salvation, such as Sunday Mass. When it leads us to omit religious acts of lesser importance without a reason, the sin is only venial, but it can quickly become more serious if it is not resisted. 

A person triumphs over the temptation to spiritual sloth, not by fleeing from it, but by resisting it. We must every day impose some sacrifices on ourselves in those matters in which we are weakest (e.g., rising early in the morning to allow time for prayer).

The Value of Detachment in Conquering the Appetites 

We should detach ourselves from exterior goods, riches, and honors. We must detach ourselves from the goods of the body, even our health. And we must avoid all complacency in the virtues that we have. And when we receive consolations in prayer, we must not dwell on them with satisfaction. 

Taking time this Sunday to reflect on the foundation of the Ignatian Exercises would be an extremely worthwhile use of time for our own spiritual development. Specifically, we read as part of the Principle and Foundation:

“Man is created to praise, reverence, and serve God our Lord, and by this means to save his soul. And the other things on the face of the earth are created for man and that they may help him in prosecuting the end for which he is created. From this it follows that man is to use them as much as they help him on to his end, and ought to rid himself of them so far as they hinder him as to it. For this it is necessary to make ourselves indifferent to all created things in all that is allowed to the choice of our free will and is not prohibited to it; so that, on our part, we want not health rather than sickness, riches rather than poverty, honor rather than dishonor, long rather than short life, and so in all the rest; desiring and choosing only what is most conducive for us to the end for which we are created.”

Conclusion

Priests should preach with the purest of intentions and pray that the will of those they reach be purified and strengthened. The authentic Catholic faith in both its doctrine and discipline along with a robust spiritual life with devotions, the Sacraments, sermons, and customs will be helpful in this life-long purification.

The fruit of the purification of the will is peace in the soul. To make progress, add these thoughts to your nightly examination of conscience since, as Father Garrigou-Lagrange warns in The Three Ages of the Interior Life, he who does not advance in the spiritual life only falls back. This applies to all of us. 

To honor Our Lady of Fatima’s request for prayer and penance, we must seek daily progress in the spiritual life, including conquering sin. As we are reminded in the apparition of Our Lady on September 13th, God does not grant favors to those who simply ask for them without any intention of conforming their lives to the precepts of the Gospel. 

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