28th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Luke 17:11-19
How can I deepen my faith? How can I come closer to God? How can I learn to trust God more? How can I give God’s grace more room in my life so that I can learn to better avoid evil and do good?
These are questions we should ask ourselves as Christians. And many of us do. You who have come to Mass here today are testifying that faith is important to you. And the long queue in front of the confessional shows that many of us want to grow in their personal spiritual life.
What helps us to grow in faith?
One of the most important tools recommended by Saint Ignatius of Loyola is the daily examination of conscience, also known as the Examen prayer. It is a prayer whose content is one’s own life and God’s trace in it. In our conscience, we can hear God’s voice speaking to us personally. The better our conscience is trained and formed by the Gospel and the teachings of the Church, the more clearly we hear this voice.
An examination of conscience shows us where our life is not yet fully in accordance with God’s will. Where, with the help of divine grace, we still need to do some work. Or where we are simply weak and should ask God for forgiveness, trusting in his infinite mercy.
In examining their conscience, many people neglect a very important step. And it is very characteristic that it is precisely those people who are very concerned about their moral improvement who often forget this step. Ignatius, however, mentions it as the very first point of the examen prayer, even before asking for the grace to be able to better recognise one’s sins and before reviewing the day in thought.
Ignatius writes:
‘The first point is to give thanks to God our Lord for the favours received.’
Gratitude is the attitude that creatures should have towards their Creator. Gratitude is therefore an expression of faith. Not being grateful for one’s own existence and all the good things one has received, on the other hand, is clearly an expression of unbelief.
In today’s Gospel, we heard how Jesus healed ten lepers, but only one of them showed him gratitude. ‘One of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice’ it says about this man. ‘He was a Samaritan,’ so he was a heretic in the eyes of the Jews. His return to Jesus can be interpreted as a conversion.
The faith of the other nine, if one can speak of faith at all here, was limited to hoping that Jesus would heal them of their illness. Perhaps they simply considered Jesus to be a particularly gifted healer. As soon as they were healed, they forgot him. They were only concerned with their health and their own worldly lives.
The one who returned to Jesus to thank him is said to have fallen on his face at Jesus’ feet. This is more than mere gratitude towards a doctor. One does not normally fall on the face to thank a doctor who has helped one. Rather, the man from Samaria recognised that the one who healed him was God himself. By prostrating himself, he shows gratitude and reverence towards God. He is expressing his faith. Therefore, Jesus said to him: ‘Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.’
Living one’s faith has a great deal to do with gratitude towards God. Anyone who wants to deepen his or her faith should therefore learn to give thanks to God!
Giving thanks to God our Lord for the favours received is the first step in examining one’s conscience. And it is the most important one. Only in an attitude of gratitude towards God and in awareness of the great favours we have received from Him can we realise how grave it is when we do not follow God’s will.
An attitude of gratitude gives us the courage to take the last two steps of examining our conscience: ‘To ask pardon of God Our Lord for my faults.’ And: ‘To resolve to amend with the grace of God.’ Because we know that God is good to us and has already given us so abundantly, we can trust Him to forgive us our wrongdoings and to equip us with the grace we need to live better according to His will.
Finally, practising gratitude towards God can teach me to love the giver of gifts more than the gifts themselves. Then my prayers will not solely revolve around myself and my own life, but I will connect affectively with Christ, the Son of the living God. Even when praying for health will my relationship with Christ be more important than my physical well-being. And my confession will no longer be an egocentric project of moral self-perfection, but a reverential and grateful amazement at the infinite mercy and goodness of God, who fills my weak soul with his grace and heals it.
To Him, our Creator and Lord, all gratitude and honour forever and ever! Amen.
