Humility and Hope
And greatness.
One week from today (January 21) is the start of Writing Through the Wardrobe: The Horse and His Boy. I’d love to see you there! (If you’re in The Habit Membership, you don’t need to register; it’s included as part of the membership). Also, a few spots remain for my two upcoming writers’ retreats: The Winter Writers’ Weekend at the Rabbit Room’s North Wind Manor (February 7-8), and The Focus Retreat at Nashville’s Scarritt-Bennett Center (March 16-10). Find out more about these retreats (and register) at TheHabit.co/Retreats.
In last week’s Tuesday letter, I suggested that it is hope that keeps us on the path; it it hope that allows us to keep doing the work that God has called us to, even (especially) when we aren’t seeing the result we hope for or expect.
Saint Augustine wrote that only the humble are given hope. The prideful want to believe that it has arrived already; the humble know that they are still on the path, and they are willing to keep plodding along. Thomas Aquinas spoke the status viatoris and the status comprehensoris. The status viatoris is the status of one on the way, a pilgrim. The status comprehensoris is the status of one who has arrived, who fully comprehends. As finite creatures, we all exist in status viatoris. You are (hopefully) moving toward your own essence; you are not yet fully yourself. God, on the other enjoys the status comprehensoris, existing fully in His essence. One day we will be complete, fully ourselves. Until then, we live in hope—in the tension between the now and the not yet.
Of course, you can choose not to move toward your essence. You can get off the path, face a different way. I think this idea of “getting off the path” is a pretty helpful working definition of sin.
Josef Pieper defines virtue as “the steadfastness of orientation toward the realization of one’s nature,” toward the good. Even virtue, then, is not an achievement or something you have arrived at, but an orientation. It’s moving further down the path toward your essence.
St. Thomas defined sin as being in conflict with reality. And reality is greater than the status quo of a broken world. I’m a big believer in Original Sin. But there is a human greatness that is more original than Original Sin. Yes, you’re fallen, but the fallen self is not your truest self. Hope keeps you on the path toward your truest self.
Next week: more on the paradoxical fact that humility and largeness of soul derive from the same source.
March 16-20. The Focus Retreat, at the Scarritt-Bennett Center in Nashville. Get more information and register here.
February 7-8. The Habit Winter Writers’ Weekend, at North Wind Manor in Nashville. Get more information and register here.
January 21-February 27. Writing Through the Wardrobe: The Horse and His Boy, the 2025 installment of my series of online creative writing classes based on C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia. Register here.
Virtual Writing Rooms on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday
Tuesday evening (today): Webinar on CS Lewis’s early life in Northern Ireland, led by Judith Millar
Wednesday afternoon: Habitation Poetry Group
Thursday evening: Office Hour
Next Monday morning: Middle-Grade Writers’ Group
Next Tuesday: First Meeting of Writing Through the Wardrobe—The Horse and His Boy (included in membership)
There's a place for you in this vibrant community of writers. Find out more about The Habit Membership here.
Quina Aragon Feels Unqualified but Compelled.
Quina Aragon is an author, editor, and spoken word poet based in Florida. Her work has been featured by organizations such as Christianity Today, The Gospel Coalition, and Risen Motherhood. Her latest book is Love Has a Story: 100 Meditations on the Enduring Love of God. In this episode, Quina and I talk about why it took her four years to write a book she thought would take ten months. We also talk about connections between counseling and writing, the ways that performing spoken word poetry has impacted Quina’s written word, and what it means to feel both unqualified to write and compelled to write.
This episode is sponsored by The Focus Retreat, a four-day writing getaway, March 16-20 in Nashville. Find out more at TheHabit.co/retreats.