Christianity is a paradoxical faith.
The more we depend on God, the freer we become.
Those who want to save their life will lose it. Those who lose their life for Christ's sake will find it (Matt 16:25).
Saint Paul demonstrates these vibrant paradoxes in a particular way. Despite experiencing beatings, shipwrecks, imprisonment, and eventually martyrdom, Paul could proclaim that nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 8:39).
Commenting on this passage from Paul, Albino Luciani, the future Pope John Paul I, wrote, “This is the fulfillment of Christian humility. It does not end in pusillanimity, but in courage, in enterprising work, and in abandonment in God!”
We need to be humble. Sadly, we can point to countless examples of Christians not acting humbly and thus distorting the faith we profess.
But this is not a humility of “pusillanimity.” Rather, we need a bold humility.