Be Grateful to God

Oct. 9th, ‘16 Sunday Homily- Fr.Francis Chirackal CMI
II KGS 5: 14-17; II TIM 2: 8-13; LK 17: 11-19

For Readings click

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/100916.cfm 

Oskar Schindler was a German industrialist. During WW II he saved over 1,000 Polish Jews from concentration camps. As the war ended, just before the Russians arrived, Schindler too decided to flee westwards. When his Jewish workers heard that he was leaving they got together to see how they could express their gratitude to him. All that was at hand to make a gift was base metal. Then one of them, by name Mr.Jereth suggested something better. He opened his mouth to show his gold bridgework. “Take this,” he said, “Were it not for Oskar, the SS would have had the stuff anyway. My teeth would be in a heap in some SS warehouse, along with the golden fangs of many others”. At first, others resisted the man’s offer but he insisted. So he had his bridgework extracted by a fellow man who was once a dentist in Krakow. A jeweler among them melted the gold down and fashioned a ring out of it. On the inner circle of the ring, they inscribed these words from the Talmud, “The one who saves a single life, saves the entire world.”

Today’s Readings remind us to be grateful for the blessings we receive. The first reading presents Namaan, the pagan Army commander, who comes back to the prophet to thank him as he was cured of leprosy by the prophet. St.Paul in the second reading advises us to remember always, Jesus Christ, who died for us and risen from the dead. The gospel presents ten lepers whom Jesus cured and only a pagan who came back to thank him.

 
A sense of gratitude and its expression are something that must be learned, especially from one’s family. Once, a man told of his father, who taught him to thank God. When he was eight years old, the vehicle they were travelling met with an accident, and he survived with minor injuries. That night his father accompanied him to bed and asked him to kneel with him and thank God that his life is saved. There, beside his bed, the two knelt as his father prayed out loud a spontaneous prayer of thanksgiving to God. That incident happened 58 years ago, but he never forgot it. It moved him deeply and gave him a greater appreciation of his dad. Above all, it taught him to be grateful to God and fellow beings. And ever since, he has made expressing gratitude to God a regular part of his daily life.

Nine lepers in the gospel story experienced physical cure while one leper, who had a heart of gratitude, found salvation in Christ along with his physical cure. As Jesus says, he was a pagan who came back to thank Jesus. We need to thank God and individuals we meet in our day-to-day lives. We may have a tendency to thank God only for happiness and gain, while complain or blame God for seemingly bitter ones. But in reality, God never allows anything in our lives, which doesn’t help our salvation, other than in which we make wrong choices using our free will. Nobody comes to our lives unless God allows and to help our salvation. We need to be led to perfection through joys and sorrows. Even if some people cause sufferings in our life due to their selfishness, wrong choices, and ignorance, for us it will be beneficial, as it is a part of our purification and salvation. Those people will be only a means of God’s grace in our lives. Every day we have a lot of things to thank God for. Everyone, who helps us, hurts us and who give us an opportunity to help them deserve our gratitude.

On the basis of today’s readings, we need to ask ourselves two questions. First, to which group of people we do  belong, grateful or ungrateful? Second, are we teaching our younger ones to be thankful to God and others? Let us pray to God for the grace to remain always grateful towards God and others and live a life of salvation.