Among the virtues that shape the Christian life, magnanimity is one of the least familiar today. The word comes from the Latin magna anima, meaning “a great soul.” St. Thomas Aquinas describes it as the virtue that disposes us to undertake great things worthy of honour and calls it, in a striking expression, “the ornament of all the virtues,” because it gives a certain greatness to the good we seek to accomplish. We speak often about ambition, confidence, success and leadership, but rarely about greatness of soul. When we describe someone as magnanimous, we usually mean that he has been generous in forgiving an enemy. This is certainly one expression of magnanimity, but the virtue has a much broader meaning.

If we are magnanimous, we will not be content simply to avoid serious faults or to do the minimum expected of us. We will want to make good use of the gifts God has given us and to respond generously to whatever he asks. This desire for greatness is very different from ordinary ambition. We can be ambitious because we want advancement, recognition or influence, and even worthwhile undertakings can become ways of proving ourselves or gaining the admiration of others. The magnanimous person seeks great things for a different reason. He wants his life to bear fruit for God and for others.

At first sight, this aspiration to greatness may seem difficult to reconcile with humility. Yet the two virtues belong together. Humility enables us to see ourselves truthfully. We recognize our limitations, acknowledge our dependence upon God and understand that whatever gifts we possess have been received from him. But humility does not require us to deny those gifts or pretend that we are incapable of anything worthwhile. If God has given us intelligence, energy, influence or some particular ability, he expects us to use it. We can know that we are weak and at the same time have great confidence in what God can accomplish through us.

The saints understood this very well. Many had an acute awareness of their own faults and limitations, yet they undertook works that seemed far beyond their natural abilities. They founded religious communities, preached the Gospel in difficult circumstances, cared for the poor and sick, and began apostolic works with few resources and no guarantee of success. Their confidence did not come from imagining themselves superior to others. They trusted that if God was asking something of them, he would also provide the grace needed to carry it out. Their humility made them depend upon him, while their magnanimity prevented that awareness of dependence from becoming timidity.

Sacred Scripture gives us a striking example of greatness of soul in David’s treatment of King Saul. Saul had become consumed with jealousy and repeatedly tried to kill David, forcing him to flee into the wilderness. One night David and his companion Abishai entered Saul’s camp and found the king asleep with his spear planted beside him. Abishai immediately saw the opportunity to end their danger and urged David to let him kill Saul. David had every human reason to be tempted. Saul had treated him unjustly, had sought his life, and stood between him and the throne. Yet David refused to raise his hand against the Lord’s anointed. He took Saul’s spear and water jar as evidence that he had been close enough to kill him and then withdrew.

David’s conduct shows us that magnanimity is not only about undertaking great projects. It also enables us to rise above the smallness that resentment can produce in us. When we have been wronged, we may take satisfaction in seeing the other person embarrassed or defeated, and we can easily justify retaliation because of what has been done to us. David refused to allow Saul’s injustice to determine the kind of man he would become. Saul’s hatred did not make him hateful. Eventually even Saul was forced to acknowledge the nobility of the man he had persecuted.

Our Lord asks the same largeness of heart from us when he tells us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. This does not mean ignoring serious wrongdoing or failing to defend ourselves and others when justice requires it. Yet many of the things that occupy our thoughts are not grave injustices but slights, misunderstandings and wounds to our pride. If we continually replay an unkind remark, resent the praise given to someone else or worry about whether our contribution has been sufficiently appreciated, our world gradually becomes centred on ourselves. Great ideals help put these things in perspective. We have more important things to do with our lives than keep an account of every offence or measure how much recognition we receive.

We acquire this freedom gradually through the choices of ordinary life. Each time we forgive rather than nourish resentment, undertake something difficult because it needs to be done, or continue serving when our effort goes unnoticed, we become less preoccupied with ourselves. God has not called us merely to avoid serious sin and lead respectable lives. Through Baptism we have been called to share in his own life and to grow in holiness. Such a vocation should awaken great desires in us, although the greatness of a Christian life may remain almost entirely hidden from public view. What matters is not whether we accomplish things that impress the world but whether we respond generously to what God actually asks.

Christ himself gives us the perfect measure of this greatness. He did not come into the world seeking comfort or recognition but to accomplish the will of his Father and give himself for our salvation. Throughout his public life he spent himself for others, and on Calvary he gave everything. The Cross overturns many of our ordinary ideas about greatness. Christ tells us that “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Christian magnanimity therefore reaches its fullest expression not in making ourselves important but in becoming capable of giving ourselves.

For most of us, this self-giving will not involve spectacular achievements. Parents may spend years making sacrifices for their children that few people fully appreciate. We may have to give time to someone who needs help when we would rather attend to our own concerns, or accept responsibilities that require more of us than we had expected. These actions may seem ordinary, but God sees the love with which they are done. St. Josemaría often emphasized that the greatest expression of magnanimity is the gift of our whole life to God. The form of that gift differs according to our vocation, but none of us is called to give God only a carefully measured portion of ourselves.

To live in this way, we also need freedom from excessive concern about what other people think. Human respect can prevent us from doing things that we know are right. We may hesitate to speak naturally about our faith, defend an unpopular truth or begin some worthwhile initiative because we fear criticism or failure. This does not mean that we should disregard advice or assume that every idea that occurs to us is inspired by God. Magnanimity must always remain joined to prudence. We need to consider circumstances carefully, listen to wise counsel and be willing to change our plans when reality shows that they are mistaken. But prudence should not become another name for fear.

The prudent course is not necessarily the safest or easiest one. Prudence helps us judge what should be done in the actual circumstances, and once we have reached that judgment we need courage to act upon it. We can become accustomed to measuring possibilities only by our own abilities, asking whether we have enough talent, resources or favourable circumstances. These are legitimate considerations, but they are not the whole question. We must also ask what God may be asking of us. If we have good reason to believe that something is his will, our sense of inadequacy need not prevent us from moving forward. We can prepare carefully, seek advice and then trust that he will give us the grace we need.

This confidence is especially important in the apostolate. We can easily underestimate what God may accomplish through one generous life. We may think that holiness belongs to exceptional people or that bringing others closer to Christ is mainly the work of priests and specialists. The saints had a much greater confidence in grace. They looked at ordinary people and saw not only what they were at that moment but what they might become if they responded generously to God. We should have the same confidence about ourselves.

We sometimes say, “I could never do that,” and in some cases this may be perfectly true if we are speaking only about our natural abilities. We need to know our limitations and should not undertake projects simply because they appeal to our vanity. Yet our limitations are not the whole story. God sometimes asks us to accept responsibilities that stretch us beyond what we think we can manage. Awareness of our weakness can even help us if it leads us to rely more fully on him rather than on ourselves.

Magnanimity also shapes the way we forgive. A serious injury can remain with us for years if we continually return to it in our thoughts. Even after the immediate anger has passed, resentment may continue to influence the way we see the person who hurt us. Christ asks us to forgive, and on the Cross he gave us the supreme example when he prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Forgiveness does not mean pretending that the injury was insignificant or that a damaged relationship can immediately return to what it was. Justice may require that wrongdoing be acknowledged and repaired. But we cannot allow another person’s wrongdoing to fill our hearts with bitterness and determine the way we live.

When we forgive, we place the injury and the person who caused it in God’s hands. This can take time, especially when the wound is deep, and we may have to renew our decision many times before our feelings follow our will. The ability to do this is prepared in the smaller situations of everyday life. We learn not to dwell on minor offences, not to insist constantly on our own rights and not to calculate whether others have given us as much as we have given them. Little by little, our heart becomes freer and more capable of the generosity Christ asks of us.

The traditional opposite of magnanimity is pusillanimity, a word that literally means “smallness of soul.” Although we rarely use the term today, the danger it describes remains very real. We become small-souled when we aim too low because we do not sufficiently trust what God can accomplish through grace. We may have ability and good intentions and still settle for a comfortable spiritual life that asks little of us. We fulfil our basic obligations and avoid serious sin, but resist anything that might require a more generous response.

Sometimes this appears as timidity. We sense that God may be asking us to take our prayer more seriously, assume some apostolic responsibility or make a difficult vocational decision, but we continue postponing our response because the obstacles seem greater than the grace we expect to receive. At other times we call this realism and tell ourselves that we are only ordinary people and that greater holiness is for saints. Yet the saints themselves were ordinary human beings who responded extraordinarily well to grace. The Apostles did not appear naturally qualified for the mission Christ entrusted to them. The Curé of Ars struggled greatly with his studies, while St. Thérèse of Lisieux lived almost her entire adult life within the enclosure of a Carmelite convent. What made their lives great was not exceptional natural ability but the generosity of their response to God.

We should therefore know our limitations without using them as an excuse for mediocrity. God does not expect us to possess talents he has not given us, but he does expect us to use generously the gifts we have received. St. Teresa of Ávila often warned against having small desires because she wanted her daughters to place their confidence in God rather than in themselves. The call to holiness exceeds our natural strength, and we cannot transform ourselves into saints through determination alone. But God does not ask us to do it alone. As we come to know him better in prayer, we learn that when he asks something of us, he also gives us the grace needed to respond.

Smallness of soul can also affect the way we look at others. We may decide too quickly that someone is unlikely to change, especially when we have seen the same faults repeated many times. Parents, teachers and anyone involved in formation can gradually lower their expectations because experience has made them discouraged. Christ looked at people differently. When he met Simon, he saw more than an impulsive fisherman; he saw Peter, the man who would one day lead his Church. Matthew was a tax collector belonging to a profession despised by many of his countrymen, yet Christ called him to become an Apostle and Evangelist. Jesus saw people as they really were, but he also saw what grace could make of them.

We need something of that same hope when dealing with others. This does not mean ignoring defects or imagining that everyone will inevitably change. We should see people realistically, but our realism must leave room for grace. A young person who is irresponsible today may later become remarkably generous, and someone whose faith seems weak may eventually develop a deep interior life. We should not place artificial limits on what God can do in another person simply because we cannot yet see the result.

The same confidence helps us when our own efforts fail. Not every worthwhile initiative will succeed, and we may undertake something after prayer and careful consideration only to see it come to nothing. We may work hard in the apostolate without seeing much visible fruit. God does not measure our lives solely by results. Sometimes what matters most is that we responded generously to what we believed he was asking. We should examine our failures honestly, learn from our mistakes and correct what needs correcting, but we do not need to regard ourselves as failures because a particular undertaking did not succeed.

Magnanimity therefore gives us a certain freedom. We can attempt difficult things without demanding a guarantee of success, because our deepest security does not depend upon the outcome. We want to serve God well and use our talents responsibly, but we leave the final results in his hands. This freedom protects us both from discouragement when things go badly and from vanity when they go well. Our aim is not to build an impressive record of achievements but to make our life fruitful in whatever way God desires.

Our Lady gives us the perfect example of this greatness of soul. At the Annunciation she was asked to accept a vocation beyond anything she could have imagined. She could not foresee all that her consent would entail, but she knew that God was asking for her response. “Be it done unto me according to your word.” Mary’s greatness did not consist in seeking an extraordinary role for herself. She trusted God and gave herself without reserve to the mission he placed before her.

We can ask her to help us respond with the same generosity. God has not created us for mediocrity. He calls each of us to the fullness of Christian life and gives each of us a particular mission, whether it is known to many people or remains almost entirely hidden. We should not allow fear of failure or an exaggerated awareness of our limitations to keep us from doing what he asks, nor should we waste too much of our energy on resentments and ambitions that make our world smaller. Christ shows us that true greatness is found ultimately in the gift of ourselves. The more fully we learn to love God and serve others, the greater our souls become. This is the ambition worthy of a Christian: not that we should become important in the eyes of the world, but that we should allow God to make our lives as fruitful as he desires.

*By the Via Virtutis team
Photo by Sebastian Pena Lambarri on Unsplash