AMBITION
- Mar 2
- 1 min read
Pope Leo XIV, on annual retreat, has been sitting at the feet of Bishop Erik Varden (Norway) who reflected on the question:
What is truth?
Christ is truth itself and so truth is personal – both objective and subjective.
When I can say, ‘I am not a thief,’ I have taken the objective truth – ‘Thou shalt not steal’ – and internalised it perfectly.
Varden makes this claim:
Ambition represents a particular form of capitulation to untruth.
Why would this be the case?
Because humility is truth.
We offer ourselves in service, after the example of Christ, not wanting to take the ‘higher places.’
Varden enlists St. Bernard (1090-1153) to cement his argument:
Ambition is a subtle ill, a secret virus, an occult pest, an artisan of deceit; it is the mother of hypocrisy, the parent of envy, the origin of vices; it is kindling for crimes, causing virtues to rust, holiness to rot, hearts to be blinded. Remedies it turns into illnesses. From medicine it extracts apathy.
Now that is some spiritual flurry. Varden says:
Ambition alienates the mind. It is a madness that comes about when truth is forgotten. A form of insanity.
A good, spiritual workout for Lent!
AMEN.
