How do I maintain a sense of healthy humility? Who helps me keep my head on straight? What do I do to avoid the twin pitfalls of self-aggrandizement or self-deprecation? Can I accept that I am a "good-enough" human being?

The keys to the word you have to offer the assembly this week are humility, lowliness, and generosity. Those who humble themselves will be exalted.

"UNLESS YOU BEGIN at the rock-solid, painful truth," spiritual writer William O'Malley maintains in his gloriously simple book Holiness, "you're pumping your legs like Elmer Fudd long beyond the cliff's edge."

Scripture this weekend praises humble service, hospitality to the afflicted, and serving without reward. All of those values can be found in the work of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, which is doing everything it can to help those affected by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster.

A friend of mine was secretly hurt when the provisions of his mother's will were announced. He'd always assumed that his mother would bequeath her wedding ring to his daughter. She was the only granddaughter and his only sibling had no children.

A grey-haired woman, neatly dressed and well into her  60s wasn’t exactly what the partners had in mind for their receptionist, but, “We’re desperate,” they reasoned. “She needs the work. Let’s take her on for a few months.”

To boost morale, a company instituted a new procedure by which any employee could fill out a form commending another employee for a particular job well done. The name of the program was, "I caught you doing something right!"

In a spirit of humility, we stand in the presence of God, confident of God's forgiveness.

You have approached Mount Zion. In the Hebrews reading we find past, present, and future. The author contrasts the "past" way of approaching God on Mount Sinai, with fear and awe, with the heavenly Jerusalem of Mount Zion, where peace and joy now prevail.

Not to enable the poor to share in our goods is to steal from them and deprive them of life. The goods we possess are not ours, but theirs. --John Chrysostom (c. 347-407)