Maybe you’ve been distracted by the run-up to Christmas - frantically buying last-minute gifts, worrying about the budget that was stretched too far or dealing with tough family dynamics. To quote the well-known cliché, we can end up forgetting the real reason for the season - God made man - and that all these things we do, are a means not an end.

Advent can be a bit of a blur for most people. And yet, if you can give it a moment it can really make an impact on these last few weeks before Christmas. It is a time of opportunity - or grace as we would say in the Catholic tradition.

In this last week before Advent, I always have mixed feelings. I’m torn between letting myself give in to the sheer and unadulterated excitement my children have about all the December merriment and climbing back under my duvet in fear and terror at the prospect of organising it all.

This is the second post in a two part series on the virtue of humility. In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus tells us, “learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (11:29).

One day in 2018 while on a visit to the Holy Land, I took a short day trip to Bethlehem. I joined a large queue outside the Basilica of the Maternity, a Byzantine-style church marking the birthplace of Christ. In front of me stood a woman in her mid-eighties very small in stature.

Our lives are measured by time, during which we change, grow old and die. No one is exempt from death. It affects everyone. St Ambrose once said, “death is the end of earthly life, but not of our existence since the soul is immortal.”