Oct. 13, 2013: 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time C

Earlier this week, all of our priests in our Diocese were at our annual retreat at a Jesuit retreat house. At lunch I sat across from a couple of priests--Fr. Louis Oubre and Fr. Phil Spano--who have served either as an associate or as pastor at Ascension Catholic Church. Fr. Louis mentioned that Fr. Cleo and Fr. Vincent were both in his middle school class at Ascension Catholic School. How remarkable, I thought, to have three priests come out of a single class. They must have been taught by a nun, I surmised. Fr. Louis said, “I spent a lot of time sitting in the corner of the class because I caused a lot of trouble for the sister.” I’m sure at the time, that sister who taught Fr. Louis wished that he would be transferred to another class. But I wonder if that sister, upon reflecting on her past, was grateful to God for having the opportunity to shape the life of a young boy who would be a future priest. I’m also sure that Fr. Louis didn’t like the discipline at the time, but later on as he reflected back on those days, he was grateful that someone cared enough to shape his character by discipline. A few days ago, Fr. Louis died suddenly in his sleep at the age of 56. I was grateful to have shared one of the last meals that Fr. Louis had on this earth.

There is an old spiritual song based on Hebrews 12:11-12 that goes like this:
No discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful, Later on however it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace, for those who have been trained by it,
No discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful.
Strengthen up your feeble arms, strengthen up your weakened knees,
Make level paths for your feet, straighten out your feeble mind
So he can make it heal, so he can make it heal,
Fix your mind on things above, above where he is king, above where we are free.

All of us here will agree that no discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful. However we know by experience that later on, it produces a harvest of spiritual fruit that we did not expect. We see examples of this in both the First Reading and in the Gospel. In the First Reading, we see Naaman, the commander-in-chief of the mighty Syrian army. He had all the trappings of worldly success--wealth, power, and fame. He had no need of God; religion played no part in his life. He is typical of a some successful people today who seem to have no need for God in their lives. However, at the height of his power, he contracted the dreaded disease of leprosy. All of a sudden his world began to crumble. He was looking for a quick fix so that he could go back and resume his old life exactly as before.

Don’t we sometimes find ourselves in Naaman’s situation as well? Things are going so smoothly, and all of a sudden, something hits us--causes us tremendous anxiety, stress, and suffering. We look for a quick fix, but there is none to be found. An illness or other circumstances bring us to our knees, and we are suddenly face to face with our poverty, weakness, and mortality. We realize how flimsy is the foundation on which we have built our hopes.

If the humiliation, pain, or suffering brings us closer to God, and makes us more spiritual, it will prove to be a blessing in disguise. For Naaman, he learned to be humble and patient. He had to learn to take orders for a change, be obedient. Naaman’s humiliation, pain and suffering proved to be well worth it because he had conversion of heart and found the true God. So in the end, he had reason to give thanks for his leprosy, because through it he received the gift of faith. Likewise, the Samaritan leper in the Gospel--the only one of the ten lepers who were healed to return to give thanks to Jesus--was the only one who grew closer to God through his illness and recovery. The other nine were healed, but their recovery from their illness did not bring them closer to God. Why? Because they lacked gratitude to God.

Everything that we face day to day, whether we perceive it as positive or negative, all are really calls from God: calls to change, grow, mature, enlarge our hearts and our horizons, and leave behind hardness of heart and narrow-mindedness in order to welcome reality in a larger and more confident manner. The big and little happinesses of life are first and foremost calls to thanksgiving, and the happiness will be even greater if we respond. It is a joyful thing to receive a gift but even more joyful to give thanks for it. Giving thanks is beautiful because it is just, because it deepens our relationship with the giver, and also because it expands one’s heart, making it receptive to still more graces.

Sorrowful events also contain calls, though with a different content. They can be invitations to faith, to hope, to patience, to courage, to acts of forgiveness, to acceptance of our limits. But there is always some particular point, and it does not necessarily become clear to us all at once. When someone is in a difficult situation, the most important thing to do, and the most liberating, is not to resolve the situation—something often beyond the person’s capacity—but to understand and follow the call present in the situation. It is not always readily discernible at first, but it will be revealed little by little to one who consents to the situation and sincerely asks what God wants.

The willingness to give something back is a great sign of gratitude. When you are full of gratitude, there isn’t room for bitterness or resentment. We must try to see the guiding hand of a loving God in all that has brought us to where we are now.

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