28th Sunday in
Ordinary Time, Year C. Luke 17:11-19
AIM: To encourage the hearers
in thanksgiving.
A man had just sat down to have lunch
in a crowded restaurant when another man asked if he could join him. The
restaurant was full and there was no other place vacant. ANo problem,@ the first man replied. ADo join me.@ Then the newcomer bowed his head, as
he was accustomed to do, to thank God for the meal he was about to enjoy. When
he raised his head again, the first man asked: ADo you have a headache?@
ANot at all,@ the newcomer replied. AI was simply thanking God, as I
always do, before I eat.@
AOh, you=re one of those,@ the first man replied. AWell, let me tell you something. I
never give thanks. I earn my money by hard work. I don=t need to give thanks to anyone
before I eat. I just start right in.@
AYou=re just like my dog,@ the newcomer said. AThat=s what he does too.@
Many people are like that man=s dog. They believe they have earned
everything they have. They see no reason to thank God for it. They forget (if
they ever knew) that the good things we enjoy were God=s blessings before they became our
achievements.
What did any one of us do to merit
being born instead of aborted, as over a million babies are in our country each
year? If we had good and loving parents, what did we do to deserve them when so
many parents are neither good nor loving? Why weren=t any of us on one of those four
planes on September 11th, 2001? What did any of us do to enjoy
sight, hearing, speech, two arms and two legs? There are plenty of people who
lack one or more of these basic faculties.
How much did any of us pay God to
make us the intelligent, beautiful people we are? Think of all the people who
helped us as we were growing up: teachers, friends, relatives. Do we take them
for granted? Ralph Waldo Emerson said that if the stars came out only once a
year, we would stay up all night to gaze at them. We=ve seen the stars so often that we hardly
ever bother to look at them any more. How easily we grow accustomed to all the
blessings God showers on us, and forget to give thanks for them.
In the gospel reading we just heard
how Jesus healed ten lepers. Leprosy was the dread scourge of the ancient
world, something like AIDS today. Because the disease was incurable, and
thought to be contagious, the leper had to live apart, calling out AUnclean, Unclean!@ lest others approach and become
infected. In healing the ten, Jesus was restoring them from a living death to
new life. Yet only one came back to give thanks for his healing. What were the
other nine thinking? It=s not difficult to imagine. Here are some possibilities:
AI think I=ll wait to see if the cure is real,
if it lasts.@
ARight. There=s plenty of time to see Jesus later,
if we have to.@
AHey C maybe we never had leprosy in the
first place.@
AI always thought I=d get well someday.@
AYeah. I always said that if you
thought positive and held the right thought,
you=d be OK.@
AJesus didn=t do anything special. Any rabbi
could have done the same.@
ANow that we=re OK, who needs him?@
AYou said it. The one we need now is
the Temple
priest. He=ll give us the certificate we need to get out of
quarantine.@
AYeah, and didn=t Jesus tell us himself to go to the Temple priest? Jesus
wouldn=t like it if we went back to him.@
So many reasons for not giving
thanks. And each one of them has a certain plausibility to it.
One of the ten does go back to Jesus,
however. He is a Samaritan, a foreigner despised by Jesus= people. If he goes to the Temple, the priest will
probably tell him to get lost. He doesn=t belong to the right religion, or
the right people. Related ethnically to the Jews, he doesn=t observe the Jewish Law. Priests in
Jesus= day were also quarantine officials.
The other nine go to the Temple
priest to fulfill the law=s provisions. The Samaritan, who lives outside the law,
follows the impulse of his heart, returns to Jesus, and gives thanks.
What about ourselves? Are we grateful
people? Do we take time each day to count our blessings, and give thanks to God
for them? As a schoolboy I used to do that in a special way on my birthday.
Kneeling or sitting in the school chapel, before Jesus in the tabernacle, I
would make a list each year of all the reasons I had to thank God. The list was
always a long one. It is many years, decades even, since I have done that. But
that youthful practice may be the reason why prayer of thanksgiving has always
been easy for me. I know of no better remedy for depression, anxiety, sadness,
or envy than consciously to count one=s blessings C and to thank God for them. Show me
someone who is embittered, angry, filled with resentment and hate B and I=ll show you a person who has little
or no time for thanksgiving. But show me a person who radiates peace and joy B and I=ll show you someone who daily and
even hourly gives thanks to God for all his blessings.
The Church helps us to be thankful
people by placing thanksgiving at the heart of its public prayer. Eucharist,
you know, means Athanksgiving.@ The Mass C every Mass C is a public act of thanksgiving to our heavenly Father for
all the blessings he showers upon us. In a few minutes we shall hear once again
the familiar story of what Jesus did for us at the Last Supper. AHe took bread and gave you thanks
.... When supper was ended, he took the cup. Again he gave you thanks and
praise.@
Giving thanks to God over something is
the Jewish form of blessing. In giving thanks to his heavenly Father for the
bread and wine, Jesus was blessing them. And in so doing he was transforming
them: changing their inner reality into his own body and blood. It is because
of this miraculous though unseen change that we genuflect to Jesus present in
the tabernacle when we come into church. We ring a bell at the consecration,
reminding everyone in the church: Jesus is here, right now, in a special way,
with a special intensity! The light burning near the tabernacle, day and night,
says the same thing.
Let me conclude with two quotations.
The first is from our own St. Louis:
Louis IX, King of France. AGive thanks frequently to God for all the benefits he has
conferred on you,@ he told his son and heir. Athat you may be worthy to receive
more.@ The second quotation is longer. It
is by a man named William Temple, who was Archbishop of Canterbury in England during
the Second World War.
AIt is probable that in most of us the
spiritual life is impoverished and stunted because we give so little place to
gratitude. It is more important to thank God for blessings received than to
pray for them beforehand. For that forward-looking prayer, though right as an
expression of dependence upon God, is still self-centered in part, at least, of
its interest; there is something we hope to gain by our prayer. But the
backward-looking act of thanksgiving is quite free from this. In itself it is
quite selfless. Thus it is akin to love. All our love for God is in response to
his love for us; it never starts on our side. >We love, because he first loved us.= (1 Jn 4:19)@
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