October 14, 2001

TWENTY-EIGHTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
We are called to show gratitude toward God for everything even the suffering He permits.

The Aramean (Syrian) Naaman (First Reading) was not only a despised pagan, but also a General in the Army of Israel's most hated enemy. He was afflicted with "leprosy" - a skin disease as dreaded in the ancient world as cancer in modern times. A captured Israelite slave girl had urged Naaman to seek a cure for Elisha, prophet of Israel's God, so he arrived with great pomp and lavish gifts.

But instead of expected dramatic prayers and power-laden gestures, Naaman was curtly commanded to take seven ritual baths in the Jordan River. He stalked off in a rage. "Are not the waters of Damascus better? Could I not wash in them and be cleansed?" His servants persuaded him to comply, and Israel's waters were vindicated as "better".

The profession of faith by this non-Israelite and servant of a powerful foreign King went beyond any claim yet made by Israelites for their God. He reigns as Lord not only over the Promised Land, but the whole world. All other gods are false.

Naaman's story teaches us that the biblical God wills to heal and save and that we must respond with humility rather than pride to receive His blessing, and that our response must include gratitude and loyal commitment. Two themes suggest themselves. First, the challenge of particularity: Do it God's way, even though seemingly arbitrary. (Why go to Mass every week, and why on Sundays? Why not baptize with rose petals instead of water?). We are, likewise, challenged by the challenge of universality: God loves everyone including cruel oppressors. Jesus obviously did not invent the command to love enemies. The church ministers equally to members of the armed forces and to pacifists, to prisoners, homosexual oriented persons. The separated and divorced, and to those afflicted with AIDS or HIV-positive.

In today's Gospel, Jesus' healing of a grateful Samaritan exemplifies how God brings salvation to the pagan world through those He has chosen. It invites our reflection upon the virtue of gratitude, pivotal, because gratitude is a purely loving response to divine gifts, quite devoid of ulterior motives. Gratitude serves as its own reward. It results in greater appreciation of what has already been given rather than function to extract even more from the benefactor.

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