Yes and thank you

 Friday's gospel (of the Annunciation) cast a light on the first part of the summary of the COLW charism:

O Mary, teach us always to say yes to the Lord every moment of our lives.

Yesterday's gospel (the grateful Samaritan leper) cast a light on the second part of that summary: 

O Mary, teach us always to give thanks to the Lord every moment of our lives.

We could not have hoped for a more serendipitous choice of gospels to get our new Book of Life journey started. In some ways, however, it is the second part of the summary of the charism which is the more mysterious, the more difficult to fathom. 

Saying 'yes' to God is not easy but there is a certain simplicity about it. It is the fundamental challenge of the human will that takes us back to Eden and the drama of the fall of our first parents. Will we be children of Eve and say no to God? Or children of Mary and say yes? Will we impede the kingdom of God through our rebellion, or will be say in our actions what we say in words every time we pray the Our Father: Thy kingdom come, they Will be done? This is a choice that takes us straight to the heart of the mystery of the Annunciation, the drama of the Holy House, and gives us a foreshadow of the spirituality of Walsingham.

But what about the thanks? In Mary's case, the expression of that thanks is not recorded until the moment of her Magnificat during the visitation to Elizabeth, though who can doubt her heart was full of thanks from the second she pronounced her fiat before the Angel Gabriel? Before Elizabeth, however,  we hear her song of thanksgiving given full rein in a hymn of praise to the God of the humble (whom the Book of Life calls "the anawim of the Lord"). In contrast, in the case of Sunday's gospel, the thanks of the Samaritan comes after Jesus shows His power in the lives of the lepers by freeing them from this terrible disease. 

On the surface, the wonder of this story is that only one leper returned to thank the Lord. At the same time, we have to admit that our own thanks can be often short lived, evaporating as the feelings of gratitude abate. That may in fact be a useful way to distinguish thanks and gratitude: that gratitude is the emotion while thanks are the action we undertake to express it. 

Nevertheless, even true gratitude must be more than a mere emotion for it can never be separated from thanks. Together they lead to a chain of realisations and actions on our part. We realise our own poverty has been made richer by a gift; we realise the gift comes from a giver who looks upon us; we respond to the gift and the giver by acknowledging the gift and the sentiments behind it. 

In this last action lies the difference between the Samaritan leper and the others whose gratitude, ironically, was but skin deep. The others realised they had received a gift and no doubt rejoiced in it. But the Samaritan alone saw beyond the gift to the Giver who had healed him. Here is the challenge of true thanks. And here also is a key to the meaning of the thanks that we ask Mary to teach us how to give. With our thanks not only do we see beyond the gift we have received. We acknowledge the Giver who gave us life and calls us to union with Him.

Let us sum up the COLW charism and the lesson of this gospel this way, therefore. Our 'yes' is the way we submit to God; our 'thanks' are the fruit of that 'yes'. With our thanks, we see beyond all His gifts to the blazing heart of love that offers itself to us.