This morning, at 6:30 am, I was asked by the celebrant of the Mass to offer the homily right before we were leaving the sacristy. It is at moments like that the grace of Orders takes over (in response to my quick and sincere prayers!). Here are a few thoughts I shared with the early morning crowd.
The Gospel was about the healing of the ten lepers, with only one returning to give thanks and praise, and then receiving not only physical healing but also spiritual. One of the marks of real mental and spiritual health is genuine gratitude, the ability and willingness to express the goodness which is before us always even in the midst of distress, turmoil or confusion. Gratitude from the heart which arises from a perspective of faith. It was the faith of the healed leper that allowed him to return and revealed to him the great things God had done for him, for which he was grateful.
God’s healing grace is always before us. It never leaves us. We just don’t see or accept it unless we look with faith at the circumstances and realities of our lives. Faith penetrates the darkness of despair,the fog of self-absorption, the anxiety of uncertainty and the discouragement of limitations and temporality.
The Samaratan leper, physically cleansed by the freely given grace of Jesus, recognized in some way his need for spiritual healing and almost reflexively knew the path was gratitude and praise. He was truly healed in body, mind and spirit.
May we begin each day with a prayer of gratitude, born in faith and end each day with such prayer.
Thank you, God for the outpouring of your healing grace into our hearts!
