An Angel straightens out Joseph - The Incarnation - B4 - Ch5

The Venerable Sister Mary of Jesus of Ágreda describes how St. Joseph resolved to devote himself entirely to serving the Blessed Virgin Mary, but that Mary wanted to be of service and not served, and she describes the competition of love and humility that arose from it. The Virgin Mary reminds us again and again about the importance of humility in the eyes of God. She also laments the actions of some saying, "For without the trusty foundation of humility such treasures cannot be confided to any man. Let all your ambition be to humble yourself in your own estimation and thought, so that in your exterior actions you may truly exhibit this humility of your interior. It must be a subject of confusion and a spur of humility for you and for all the souls to have the Lord as their Father and Spouse, to see, that the presumption and pride of worldly wisdom are more powerful in its devotees than humility and true self-knowledge is in the children of light. Consider the watchfulness, the untiring study, and care of ambitious and aspiring men. Look upon their struggle to be esteemed in the world, their strivings never at rest, though so vain and worthless; how they conduct themselves outwardly according to the false notions which they have of themselves; how they pretend to be what they are not, and how they exert themselves to obtain through these false pretenses the treasures, which, though only earthly, they do not deserve. Hence it should be a cause of confusion and shame to the good, that deceit should urge on the sons of perdition with greater force than truth urges the elect; that the number of those, who in the world are anxious to strive in the service of their God and Creator, should be so small in comparison with the number of those who serve vanity; that there should be so few of the elect, though all are called (Matthew 20:16)."