The Core of Religion

Gospel: Luke 17: 11-19

The story of the ten lepers provides us with a lesson in what is at the core of authentic religion - gratitude.  To be grateful is to recognize the fact that we are creatures and God is the creator, that all we have and are come from God as a gift.  We have done nothing to deserve anything we have and are.  Thus, our fundamental posture to God and the world is gratitude for all things.  

We say that the Eucharist - a word that means thanksgiving - is the source and substance of our lives.  To celebrate the Eucharist is to give thanks.  But is this really our source and substance? Do we really live the idea of gratitude as the core of our faith life? We who think we are the only worthy ones before God, we who consider ourselves to be the "faithful Christians" before God and others - is that the posture of gratitude we bring to the world and to God's table?

Ten lepers were healed by Jesus; only one returned to give thanks.  Many of us go to church regularly, but not all come to give thanks.  The one leper of today's story reminds us what the core of our faith is: to be grateful that God has created us, God has healed and restored us, God is present to us always.  May his example guide our lives of faith in the world.