A newly elected mayor of a certain city was seeking the support of all stakeholders in his constituency. He had heard much about the priest in the city’s small Catholic Church and invited him out to dinner at an expensive restaurant, to which the priest obliged with gratitude. As the food arrived, the mayor pulled his silverware and started eating. The priest asked, “Don’t you say some prayer of thanksgiving before eating?” The mayor replied: “There’s no need to thank anyone, except perhaps me, for paying for the food.” He added, “I earned the money by the sweat of my brow; so after paying for the food, it becomes mine and I just dig in.” The priest retorted, “Sounds like what my dog Sally would do. She digs in, once she sees her food.” You bet...the two men had an exciting evening!
Many in the society behave like Mr. Mayor. For them, everything that came their way resulted from their hard work, while only lazy people are miscarried, stillborn or aborted. By their power they had loving parents who didn’t abandon them in pursuit of alcohol and drugs. Their hard work made them American citizens instead of Sudanese or Afghans or Syrians. By their hard work they earned eyes to see, feet to walk, intelligence and beauty, which the lazy people lack. Don’t you see that it’s easy to grow accustomed to the blessings that surround us and forget to give thanks?
The Gospel today presents us with ten lepers, nine of whom were of Jewish descent, and one a Gentile. At the time of Jesus, leprosy was the most dreaded disease, consigning its sufferers to a new social condition as outcasts. A Jew who suffered from leprosy became socially-speaking a gentile; hence, leprosy was the factor that united the Jewish lepers with the Samaritan leper. Calamity often unites people so they forget differences. If a natural disaster occurs and animals run for dear life, tigers, lambs and rabbits, raccoons and cats can congregate at some safe ground in peace with each other. After 9/11 the Democrats and the Republicans were of one mind, and passed bills that would otherwise have involved deeply contentious partisan battles.
Jesus heard the cries of these lepers and healed them; but no sooner had they found themselves healed than their differences set in. The Samaritan could no longer join the now ‘clean Jews’ to the temple. Their bodies might have been healed but they still carried the stench of racial division. Leprosy was just only one of the problems that the Samaritan had, and perhaps the least. His deeper social situation remained—a gentile and an outcast. Luke’s motif in this Gospel account was that the gentile is one whom God received without consideration of social, religious or any other status. While the now healed leprous Jews went to their temple priest, the Samaritan returned to the one who embodies the TEMPLE and the PRIESTHOOD—the Incarnate Son of God. He showed himself with thanks to the High Priest of the New Covenant, who alone could sign him off as totally redeemed in body and spirit. The Lord looked out to him as a member of the human community, not as Asian, Hispanic, European or African.
St. Paul asks in the second reading, “What do you have that you have not received?” (I Cor 4:7). It’s not by our making that we’re born strong or weak, beautiful or less so, rich or poor; hence, thanksgiving is a debt we owe. Thanksgiving and praise might be the most lacking thread in our prayer tapestry. A spiritual author notes that “gratitude draws benefits, and the benefactor loves to be reminded of his bounty.” We owe gratitude for God’s many blessings. The Mass is the most potent way to give God thanks, given its name—Eucharistia, which means “Thanksgiving.” It’s a shame that some stop attending Mass claiming they’re busy with stuff; like the nine lepers who so wanted to return quickly to a busy life after their healing that they ignored their healer. Be like Naaman and the Samaritan: give thanks for all God’s benefits.
Fr. Chukwudi Jo Okonkwo