Homily: 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle C
There’s one of those “make you think”
quotes that runs around on the internet and in social media and which lands in
front of me every once in a while. It
asks a very important question that is intended to inspire you to change your
attitude for the better. It asks this:
“What if you woke up tomorrow with only the things that you were thankful for
today?” (REPEAT)
Anyone who has lost a loved one
suddenly to an accident or a sudden illness can probably tell you of the regret
they sometimes feel that they didn’t appreciate more the time that they had
with that person. When a fire destroys a
family’s house and all their personal possessions, they too start to realize what
a gift it was to have what they had, even though they weren’t always very
thankful for it. None of us, if we are
paying attention to the news, can imagine what it must be like for the people
of southwestern Haiti as entire villages and towns and hundreds of lives were
swept away by Hurricane Matthew. In
their grief is an inherent acknowledgement that all that they had and have now
lost was a gift; and they are thankful for the very fact that they are still
alive.
The question, therefore, is inviting
us to realize the truth that anyone who has experienced any of these things can
tell us is true: that it is better to appreciate the things that you have,
while you have them, because tomorrow they could all be taken away from you.
Our scriptures today speak of the type
of conversion to thankfulness that this internet question seeks to
inspire. Naaman, a high-ranking Syrian
official (and, thus, who wasn’t a member of the Israelite people) has been
afflicted with a type of skin disease that people in the Ancient Near East
simply referred to as “leprosy”. This
was devastating to him as this meant that he would be ostracized from public
society for fear of infecting others. At
the prompting of a young Jewish servant, Naaman seeks out the prophet Elisha,
hoping to find a cure.
Elisha instructs Naaman to wash seven
times in the Jordan River. Naaman
resists, at first, thinking that if all he had to do was wash seven times in a
river, that he could have done that from home.
Encouraged by his companions, however, Naaman agrees to Elisha’s plan:
accepting that there is something special about washing in the Jordon River,
specifically.
Today we heard that Naaman, after
washing in the Jordon, which cleansed him of his leprosy, returned to offer
Elisha a gift of thanksgiving. Naaman
was a high-ranking official in another nation and in the culture of that time
was not required to return and offer the prophet anything. Because he had seemingly lost everything,
however, he was much keener to be thankful for having something that was very
important to him restored to him. And
when Elisha declined his generous gift, Naaman asked if he could take two big
piles of dirt back with him to Syria so that he could offer continual thanks to
Yahweh, the God of Israel, on the very same ground on which he first encountered
him. Having been saved from losing
nearly everything, Naaman converted his life to thankfulness.
In the Gospel, ten men who had been
afflicted with leprosy cry out to Jesus to ask for healing. Similar to Elisha, Jesus instructs them to do
something very simple: “go show yourselves to the priests”. In faith, they respond and, as they go to
show themselves to the priests, they find that they have been healed. Certainly every one of them was appreciative
of the fact that their health had been restored to them. Only one, however, returned to give
thanks. This one, a Samaritan (who were
despised by the Jews because they were “half-breeds” of both Jewish and
non-Jewish ancestry), recognized the great gift that he had received and
returned to give thanks to the giver of the gift. Acknowledging that he had been saved through
no effort of his own, he converted his life to thankfulness.
When we recognize something that we
have as being a gift—that is, as something that we didn’t earn and were
incapable of earning—then we are much more apt to be thankful for it. When we’ve worked for something and have
achieved or acquired it, we tend to look at it as our just due. Thus, although we certainly enjoy what we
have earned, we are much less likely to be grateful for having it. When we lose such a thing, we tend to be
angry, as if a great injustice has been committed against us. In other words, our reaction is not a
residual thankfulness for having been able to enjoy whatever it was, but rather
anger bred from a greediness that only desires to enjoy it more. Now, while we should never be content with
injustice, conversion to a life of thankfulness means that, even when we’ve
lost something unjustly, we acknowledge the gift that it was to have had it and
so give thanks.
As your pastor I feel like it is my
duty to remind you of the reason that we come here week after week. Many Catholics, I fear, would limit their
reasoning for coming to Mass to a sense of duty: to fulfill their “Sunday
Obligation”. This, although noble in
itself, is limited and, frankly, unsatisfying.
My reminder to you is that we don’t come here to celebrate the “Holy
Satisfaction of our Obligation”, but rather we come here to celebrate the “Holy
Eucharist”—that is, the Holy Thanksgiving. In other words, we come here not to try to
satisfy a vengeful God so that he won’t strike us down, but rather to offer him
the ultimate sacrifice of thanksgiving for all of the blessings of life
(including the blessing of life) that we have enjoyed in the past week. In it we receive many things, of course, but
the core reason we come is to offer God worship and praise in thanksgiving of
all of the abundant gifts that he bestows upon us.
And so, the question comes to us
again: “What if you woke up tomorrow with only the things that you were
thankful for today?” My brothers and
sisters, if you are worried that right now you wouldn’t wake up with much, then
today is the day to take action.
Starting today, if we aren’t already doing it, let us commit ourselves
to taking time to give thanks for every good thing that we’ve received in the
world. Then, each week, as we return
here to give thanks to God for all of these gifts, we’ll be ready to drop in
the collection basket all of the blessings (and even the struggles) for which
we are thankful so as to unite them to the sacrifice of thanksgiving that we
offer on the altar: the perfect sacrifice of Jesus that won for us the greatest
gift ever, our salvation and the gift of eternal life. In doing so, we will not only find greater
satisfaction and joy in our lives, but we will also prepare ourselves for the fullness
of joy that awaits us in heaven. May
God’s grace strengthen us as we commend ourselves to this good work.
Given
at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – October 8th & 9th,
2016
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