Faber: a generous belief of others

Thursday, June 21, 2012
Meditation:
    For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.
    —Romans 12:3 (NIV)
Quotation:
    How many times in life have we been wrong when we put a kind construction on the conduct of others? We shall not need our fingers to count those mistakes upon. Moreover grace is really much more common than our querulousness is generally willing to allow. We may suspect its operations in the worst men we meet with. Thus, without any forced impossibility, we may call in supernatural considerations in order to make our criticisms more ingenious in their charity. When we grow a little holier, we shall summon also to our aid those supernatural motives in ourselves, which, by depressing our own ideas of ourselves, elevate our generous belief in others.
    ... Frederick William Faber (1814-1863), Spiritual Conferences, London: Thomas Richardson & Son, 1860, p. 27-28 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me a measure of humility. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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