{"id":44958,"date":"2025-04-19T21:46:28","date_gmt":"2025-04-20T04:46:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=44958"},"modified":"2026-06-05T08:43:42","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T08:43:42","slug":"have-americans-forgotten-that-humility-is-a-virtue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/have-americans-forgotten-that-humility-is-a-virtue\/","title":{"rendered":"Have Americans Forgotten That Humility is a Virtue?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Have Americans forgotten that humility is a virtue? On Maundy Thursday, Christians commemorated the Last Supper, when Jesus washed the feet of his disciples. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It\u2019s Holy Week on the Christian calendar, so I’m going to write about Jesus today — about what Jesus did on Maundy Thursday two millennia ago.\u00a0The story is two thousand years old, but it speaks to what\u2019s going on in the US today.<\/p>\n

Jesus washed his disciples’ feet.<\/p>\n

Jesus on Maundy Thursday<\/strong><\/h5>\n

As you may or may not know, Good Friday observes the day of Jesus’s crucifixion. Maundy Thursday observes the night of Jesus’s last meal with his followers.<\/p>\n

The Last Supper is a scene many will recognize from Leonardo da Vinci\u2019s painting of Jesus and his disciples sitting down to a meal together.\u00a0But when I think of Maundy Thursday, it\u2019s not the Last Supper that comes to mind. It\u2019s what Jesus did at the end of that meal.<\/p>\n

He wrapped a towel around his waist, poured water into a bowl and washed the feet of his disciples, every last one of them, even the ones who would later, when the going got tough, betray or deny him.<\/p>\n

There he was, the Son of God, kneeling before a bunch of fishermen and tax collectors, washing their feet.<\/p>\n

Have Americans Forgotten That Humility is a Virtue?<\/strong><\/h5>\n

In the Christian scheme of things (and in the scheme of things according to most of the world\u2019s wisdom traditions, as far as I can tell), it is the humble, compassionate and just among us who will ultimately prevail.<\/p>\n

That is the message Jesus was driving home to his disciples that night, I think, shocking and stunning them with God\u2019s extreme love for them and for all of God\u2019s human creations.<\/p>\n

\"the-last-supper-leonard-da-vinci01495\"
Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper,” painted in 1495. Public domain<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Which is why I put aside my to-do list on Thursday and drove down the hill to church, where a couple dozen twenty-first-century Christians were gathering to do what Jesus had done. They knelt in front of each other and washed each other\u2019s feet.<\/p>\n

They humbled themselves before each other and before God. They embraced humility as the centerpiece of their Christian faith.<\/p>\n

Blessed Are the — Meek?<\/strong><\/h5>\n

As I watched these goings-on, a line from the Sermon on the Mount came to mind: \u201cBlessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like most people, when I think of meek, I think of someone who hasn\u2019t the will to stick up for themself. I imagine a Donald Trump style loser. Somebody with no cards, just a pair of twos.<\/p>\n

But maybe the meek — the humble — are not so weak. Maybe it takes strength to be humble. Maybe it takes strength to be trusting and hopeful and compassionate and just.<\/p>\n

There are a lot of that kind of meek people in the world, I’ve noticed. I had supper with a few of them the other night, the night on the Christian calendar when Jesus assures his people that, in the end, it is the meek who will inherit the earth.<\/p>\n

More about the Christian calendar at “The Virgin Blanca and Baby Jesus \u2014 Still Smiling This Advent Season After 700 Years.”<\/a>\u00a0 Was Jesus a loser? I took up that question back in 2016 with “Jesus Was a Loser \u2014 Does That Make Donald Trump a Winner?”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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Have Americans forgotten that humility is a virtue? A couple dozen Christians met at my church on Thursday for a reminder.\u00a0 Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48556,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[2987,135,34,2689,2988,2989,22,2990,2230],"class_list":["post-44958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-my-rocky-spiritual-journey","tag-blessed-are-the-meek","tag-christianity","tag-dont-miss","tag-holy-week","tag-humble","tag-humility","tag-jesus","tag-maundy-thursday","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44958"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48559,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44958\/revisions\/48559"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}