Posted on 02/20/2020 8:59:37 AM PST by Salvation
None of us likes to think we are prideful. It’s always someone else; that guy over there is the arrogant one. One way of gauging is to ponder how well we accept being corrected. Consider the following verses from Proverbs:
He who corrects an arrogant man earns insult; and he who reproves a wicked man incurs opprobrium. Reprove not an arrogant man, lest he hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you. Instruct a wise man, and he becomes still wiser; teach a just man, and he advances in learning (Proverbs 9:7-12).
Which one are you?Do you bristle when someone corrects you or do you grow wiser from the input you receive?
It’s not easy to accept criticism or correction without feeling some degree of humiliation, particularly when it is public in some manner.
Of course, there are different kinds of correction.There is the sort that involves facts about which we are mistaken. At other times need to be set straight on the proper procedures to be followed in some situation. Finally, there are times when we have failed in a moral sense and need to be summoned back to what is right. Whatever the case, being corrected can be difficult, and how we handle it is a good indicator of pride or humility in our soul.
There are, to be sure, times when people do not correct us in the best way possible.Perhaps they are smug or seek to embarrass us. Even in those cases, though, if we are wrong, we should view correction as beneficial, regardless of how poorly it is delivered.
Note also that the passage from Proverbs above links humility to wisdom and learning.Thus, something we call docility is related to humility. The word docility comes from the Latin word for being teachable. Too often, we can be stubbornly opinionated and resist being taught. It is important to ask the Lord for greater docility.
In preparation for Lent, take this short self-test for pridefulness: How do you take correction? How teachable are you?
Monsignor Pope Ping!
I have to admit I fail this test , and I need to improve in this area.
One thing I do notice though, is if I don’t fully respect the person correcting me, I tend to get a little cranky. If the person correcting is one I hold in high esteem I can learn from them much easier. Anyone else experience similar reactions?
Well, what are we really talking about here?
If we’re talking the sort of “correction” that’s really equivalent to bitching, nagging, complaining, and personal attacks, no I will not accept “correction” in good grace.
If I had a dollar for every time I heard “you just can’t take constructive criticism” ... we’ll, I’d at least have money for a nice lunch tomorrow.
Now, if we’re sticking to the realm of facts, then it’s a matter of whether the facts you bring to the table are more convincing than my set of facts. That’s why we have debates over everything from politics to theology.
If I’m flat-out wrong about, say Nov. 11, 1918 being the date of the Armistice that ended the Great War on the Western Front, then I’m wrong and I will admit it.
But if we get into a debate about the causes of that war — well, scholars don’t all agree and will probably be arguing until the end of time.
Monsignor Pope is a wise and learned man, but I don’t find his argument about pridefulness particularly compelling. I’m not a schoolboy who will meekly submit to having his knuckles rapped.
Correction =. Having a wife
I think you nailed it.
Personally, I’m one of that rare breed, the lifelong straight bachelor.
There are worse things than being alone. Among these: Being yelled at all the time and treated with no respect, regardless of the fact that you’re a hard-working and usually genial fellow.
With American woman today, a regular guy has no chance whatsoever. You are never good enough for them. They will always find fault.
One thing I’ve never understood about women is why so many of them are so desperately unhappy even amidst the greatest prosperity in human history. Too many female hearts have been corrupted by feminism.
Every sinful act we do is just a symptom of our pride.
It’s better that you stayed single then.
Before reading the article I scanned that word cloud for a good two minutes, looking for the word...unteachable; because I have come to think of unteachable-ness as being a great gauge for how prideful someone is or is not. And whaddayaknow but it’s the good monsignor’s main point. “Unteachability” and humility are completely incompatible. The Lord has been lovingly knocking me through walls for a couple of decades, encouraging me to learn and adopt His ways in lieu of my own. I am more teachable now that I used to be. Sore, too. Tired of walls. Really tired of walls. Funny (ha) thing is, a wall is only a wall because I in my stubbornness make it be one. Without my pride, there is no wall for the Lord to swat me through. He is patient and persistent. And really thorough. Dang it.
This isn’t about my personal bitterness over innumerable rejections, although it would be foolish to deny this has influenced my perceptions.
But I’m a trained observer — an old-school reporter/editor who knows that you can’t get emotionally involved in your story. I would come to the same conclusion even if I had a happy and stable marriage, simply by looking at the devastated families surrounding me.
I certainly know some couples who appear genuinely devoted to each other, as the Lord intended.
But that’s not the world we live in today. Try reading Christopher Lasch’s “The Culture of Narcissism,” published in the late 1970s but absolutely prophetic.
My mother raised me to be a gentleman. My father raised me to be a man of my word. No woman I ever dated/courted ever had any complaint along this line.
Instead, it was always “You’re a great guy, Nothingburger, and you’ll find someone someday.”
Which I take to mean: I didn’t bring sufficient wealth, looks, or status to the table.
Alternatively, I wasn’t a drunk, derelict, or druggie.
You get any group of regular working guys together long enough and sooner or later somebody is going bring up one of the most painful questions of our era: “Why are so many women attracted to bad men?”
Affluence and material possessions are not what satisfies.
If you think women should have nothing to complain about because they are in the midst of the greatest prosperity this world has ever seen, then you are better off single because you don’t understand what relationships are all about.
My buds and I would ask the same question back in the day.
But on the flip side of that we'd also ask the question, why are good guys sometimes attracted to bad women?! What's he see in her??
Thanks for patronizing me. I just love being talked down to.
And that’s an attitude I’ve seen in a lot of women I’ve known and some I’ve dated.
You don’t know one blessed thing about the way I’ve treated these women. You want somebody who’ll listen to you, you want somebody who keeps his word, you want somebody with a work ethic. I’m your guy.
And I’ve found that all the good, traditional values my parents tried to instill in me don’t get you very far in today’s socio-sexual free-for-all.
Try to be a gentleman at all times? Many women will take it as a sign of weakness.
Yet you have the nerve to say “you don’t understand what relationships are all about.”
I just love being insulted on these thread. Sometimes I think FR is nothing but a bunch of ignorant know-it-alls rather than principled conservatives.
That’s a fair comment, point taken.
Actually, over the years, I’ve developed a pretty good ability to keep bitter, angry females at arm’s length.
The problem is that a lot of people of both sexes are good at putting up an attractive front. By the time you really get to know what trouble they are, you’ve invested time, money, and feelings.
Personally, I find that the only way to survive in this life is to train yourself to dull your emotions as much as possible. Or at least don’t show any.
However, as John Wayne said in “The Shootist”: “I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, I won’t be laid a hand on. I don’t do these things to other people and I require the same from them.”
Good point on the “unteachable.”
**ignorant know-it-alls**
or ignorant pridefuls
If you’re celebrating your own wit thinking that you’ve put me in my place in just three mighty words, think again.
As I said in my original post, I resent being talked down to, patronized, nagged, belittled, etc.
And believe me, I’ve had to put up with my share over 62 years.
“Backward, oh backward turn time in thy flight. I just thought of the comeback I needed last night.”
Every schoolyard has its bully. These bullies grow up to be adults. And while we have laws against aggravated assault, a lot of nasty people just develop more underhanded techniques for getting sadistic pleasure at the expense of others.
There’s a difference between “pridefulness” and standing up for yourself.
(Here's a gigantic answer that you probably weren't looking for.)
The answer to your question likely spans all of human history and not just this age. The Internet's best resource (as of my last visit over a year ago, anyway) for such things is Chateau Heartiste. The proprietor of the place has created an environment where science and anecdote combine to show that, with regard to women being attracted to bad men and various other things that don't jive with what we're taught, the best thing you can do is: "Watch what they do, not what they say." (For the record Heartiste is not a follower of Christ, so there's no limit to the worldliness of the place. But his website presents ((or at least presentED)) as pure a distillation of the female psyche that you'll find on the net. Lotta other political stuff, as well. He's a huge Trump guy.)
ANYWAY. Women are largely motivated by finding the (subjectively) best donor to sire their kids. And they want someone to provide for those kids during the raising years. Oftentimes, donor and provider aren't the same guy. Someone boiled it down to "Alpha f*cks and beta bucks." Get knocked up by Rock Band Drummer, then marry Mister Steady Software Guy so his resources will provide for the offspring. Her attraction to the two types of men is legitimate in both cases; but the motivations are different. Women are (in numbers too great to ignore) sexually attracted to wilder guys in ways that they aren't as attracted to the more stable types. And that stark reality is not something that we're supposed to notice. We are confused about women being attracted to bad men only because we are taught from birth that women want Mr. Steady or Mr. Nice. Practical experience says it's more complicated than that.
Unfortunately, as our culture accelerates RPM's at the drain, there's effectively no community restraint applied to this real dynamic. There's no such thing as common shame at premarital sex, shacking up, out-of-wedlock births...stuff that was absolutely trash behavior for much of this country even two generations back. Women are now free (and culturally encouraged) to spend their most attractive years "chasing" whoever gives them the strongest tingles. Eventually the lie of that lifestyle rears its head, at least as soon as a woman's youthful looks start to fade. Then it's time to get serious and find a stable guy to sire some kids and/or help you raise the one she's already had.
It takes two to tango, obviously, and there are plenty of men taking advantage of the degraded virtues of post-Christian Western Civ. But women are the topic here. In my opinion any woman today who bucks the trend and decides to marry young; have a family; and stay faithful to her husband, through thick and thin is worthy of the highest praise. There's nothing in day-to-day American culture that encourages those choices. And much to encourage the opposite.
And I just checked in on Heartiste. He's not added any new posts since May 2019. I know that Wordpress shut down his years-old blog sometime in the past couple of years; and he apparently started the new existing site after that fact. But there's not much action there now; and I don't know to what extent he rescued past content from the old Wordpress blog.
Thank you. And thanks for posting these Msgr Pope entries. He’s quite possibly the REAL Most Interesting Man in the World.
Eh, the post doesn’t look so huge in wide format.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.