Episode 011 - Homily | Gratitude Changes Everything (October 12, 2025)

Have you ever noticed how gratitude can change a room?

When someone says thank you, truly says thank you, not because they have to, but because they really mean it.

Something in the room shifts.

The air lightens, the space feels softer.

Gratitude has this mysterious power to open hearts and to close wounds.

It takes what ordinary, it takes what's ordinary and makes it holy.

That's what today's readings are all about.

Not politeness, not about being kind or having good manners, but this deep kind of gratitude that only comes from faith.

Because gratitude and faith are inseparable.

You can't have one without the other.

Just to give a little context, and for today's first reading, Naeman shows us what gratitude is about.

He wasn't even Jewish.

He was a Syrian general, a powerful man, successful, respected.

But beneath the medals and the armor, there was a man who was diseased, ashamed, isolated by leprosy.

And what he when he hears there's a prophet of Israel that can heal him, he goes, but with his pride still intact.

Elisha the prophet doesn't even doesn't even come out to meet him face to face.

He simply sends word with an attendant saying, Tell him to go wash in the Jordan seven times.

Naaman says, That's it.

No ceremony, no lightning bolts, just some muddy water that I have to dunk into seven times.

Naaman was furious.

He wanted a spectacle, not simplicity.

He wanted to control the situation.

But someone, maybe a friend or someone he was traveling with, said to him, If this prophet had told you to do something very difficult, you probably would have done it.

Then why not do this, which is much simpler?

So Naaman goes.

He humbles himself.

He steps down into the Jordan, and when he rises, he's completely clean.

The scriptures tell us that his skin is that of a baby.

More importantly, his heart has been transformed and cleaned.

The real healing was his pride.

He returns to Elisha overflowing with gratitude and declares, Now I know that there is no God on all the earth except the God of Israel.

Gratitude made him a believer.

Faith healed his body.

And the two become one, faith and gratitude.

Then the gospel takes us a little deeper.

Ten lepers stand at a distance because that's what leprosy does.

It separates, it isolates.

It says, You don't belong.

And from a distance they cry out, Jesus, Master, have pity on us.

And Jesus doesn't come closer.

He doesn't shout, be healed.

But what does he do?

He says, Go show yourselves to the priests, which is fascinating if you think about it.

That's what you do after you've been healed, not before.

But they go, they go to the priest in obedience, in a step of faith, and as they're going along their way, they realize that they've been healed.

Imagine that moment when one is able to look down and see new skin, a hand restored, a face no longer scarred.

Imagine the joy these men were facing at being able to return into society.

Ten hearts must have been bursting, but only one of them turns back.

Only one returns to Jesus, falls at the feet of Jesus, gives him thanks.

He wasn't even a Jew.

He was a Samaritan.

He was an outsider among outsiders.

But Jesus says to him, There were ten of you, weren't there?

Ten were made clean.

Where are the other nine?

Rise, go your way.

Your faith has saved you.

The others received healing, but this one received salvation.

Why?

Because gratitude completes the miracle.

That's something we need to understand.

Gratitude is part of the faith cycle.

Faith and gratitude, they feed off of each other.

Faith says, I believe you, Lord.

Gratitude says, I trust you, Lord.

And together they become worship.

The truth is, most of us are really good at asking God for help.

Lord, I need this.

Help me from this.

Where are you?

I need help with this difficult situation.

I need help with a diagnosis.

We know how to pray for things.

And that's good.

Why?

Because God wants to help his children.

But when the storm passes, when the prayers are answered, do we return back to God in thanksgiving?

Most do.

What I want to stress is that gratitude is the memory of the heart.

It's how we keep close to God.

It is how faith grows within us from something that we say to how we live.

St.

Paul understood this better than anyone.

When he writes to Timothy in the second reading, he's sitting in prison, a man chained, forgotten by the world.

But he's not bitter.

He's not begging for release.

He's thankful.

He's thankful because Paul remembers all that God had done for him.

Saul, the persecutor, the man who hated Christ, who hunted down Christians, and he remembers what Christ did for him.

How Christ met him on the road, blinded him so he could finally see, forgave him when he deserved condemnation.

Paul never forgot that.

So even in chains, Saint Paul says the word of God is not chained.

He knows that gratitude isn't about circumstances.

He was in prison.

He was thanking God for his salvation.

He doesn't thank God for comfort, he thanks God for mercy.

That's faith that is matured.

That's gratitude that's been purified.

And that brings us here today to us around this altar.

Because the Eucharist we celebrate right now means exactly that thanksgiving.

Every mass is a school of gratitude.

We come here not just to ask God for things, but we need to come around this altar and remember everything that God has done for us.

So when you come forward today to receive Jesus in the Eucharist, come like that Samaritan, that one who came back to Jesus giving thanks.

Come with gratitude, come saying thank you, Lord.

Thank you, Lord, for healing me, for forgiving me, for never giving up on me.

Don't come out of habit, same old, same old.

Come with a heart that's full of thanksgiving.

Why?

Because gratitude changes everything.

Gratitude makes faith alive.

Gratitude turns fear into trust, worry into worship, and pain into purpose.

Naaman the Naaman the foreigner found faith through thanksgiving.

The Samaritan, the outcast, found salvation through gratitude, and Paul the prisoner found joy through mercy, remembering all that God had done for him.

Every one of them was transformed, not by getting what they wanted, but by realizing what God had already done for them.

And so when we come to the Eucharist, the great thanksgiving, maybe with burdens, maybe with a heavy heart, maybe with life issues, maybe even with questions.

Or maybe today you're feeling a bit far from God.

But even then, even now, there is a reason to give thanks to Almighty God.

Thank Him for the breath in your lungs.

Thank Him for the people sitting next to you.

Thank Him for the mercy and for all that He's done to carry you through life, for the forgiveness that keeps chasing you, and for a love that He has for you that won't let go.

Because when you live with the attitude of gratitude, everything shifts.

You stop comparing yourself to others, you start praising God, you stop demanding and start thanking.

You stop chasing what's missing, and you start to notice around you all that has been given to you.

So be the one that returns.

Be the one who comes back to Jesus, the one who kneels at his feet and says, Thank you, Lord.

Thank you for what you've done for me.

Thank you for what you're doing for me.

And thank you for who you are in my life.

My brothers and sisters, gratitude is not just a word we say.

Gratitude is a way we must live.

It is the way we live when we finally realize how much we've been loved.

And when you live this way, faith deepens, hope grows, and life itself becomes a prayer of thanksgiving.

Amen.