With Gratitude

     “When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.”                
                                                                                                       G. K. Chesterton


     Taking things for granted, is such an easy way to live.

     Do we appreciate our health, even with all our aches and pains? Do we appreciate our family and friends for who they are; for the way they live their generous lives, giving of themselves to help us as well as others? Are we taking such things as our homes, electricity, hot and cold water, indoor plumbing, heat and air conditioning, all for granted? Are we really grateful that normally they all work when we just push a button or switch? We expect our cars to run, our supermarkets to be full, along with our stomachs! We are often so oblivious to all that we DO HAVE, that we just expect it will always be there and forget to be grateful that it usually is!

     As a nation, we experience such abundance, that we have come to expect far too much from life.

     This attitude of entitlement, is much too prevalent!

     We are quick to focus on what goes wrong, and not on what goes right. We are quick to see the half empty glass, instead of being grateful for the glass half full. We need to practice looking at all we DO HAVE and thank God for it. We have been blessed as a nation, with the great privilege of practicing our faith and worshiping God -- a gift we must NEVER take for granted!

     The history of our country is filled with our ancestors making time to give thanks to God for all of their blessings. It began with the pilgrims in Plymouth, and became an annual custom throughout New England.

     The first national Thanksgiving was declared in 1777 by the Continental Congress.  President George Washington became the first president to proclaim a Thanksgiving holiday in 1789. But it was not until 1863, when President Lincoln pronounced that Thanksgiving would be celebrated on the last Thursday of November, that it was celebrated nationally.

     Our ancestors lived difficult and challenging lives. They risked much and suffered for us to experience all that we have in this great country of ours. Looking at all of the blessings they were given, not the loses or hardships, was what make them so great! We need to recapture their attitude of gratitude and thank God for all that we do have. We have to take the time to look at see that God IS good and thank Him.

     We should not need a national holiday declared to begin to thank God for all that we have and develop hearts full of thanks. This is something we can and should make a conscious effort to do on a daily basis.

     Begin each day thanking God for three things with which He’s blessed you: ability to get out of bed, a hot shower, breakfast, your car, your warm house. Notice throughout your day, people or things that have helped to make your life a bit easier: your spouse, your children, daily Mass, Eucharistic Adoration, having a job, the clerk at the supermarket. End each day thanking God for three things: the end of a hectic day, having available gas to put in your car and the money to do it, good friends, the beauty of the earth that we often look past, and of course, God’s love and presence in our lives.

     Being grateful doesn’t always naturally to us and it takes mindfulness and practice. We have to get past ourselves and our selfishness and begin to see with eyes full of appreciation and wonder. Maybe writing in a gratitude journal would help us to count our blessings when things aren’t going as we’d like.

     Our good God has lavished us with so very much! Often, like the nine lepers, we forget to give thanks.

     Let us be like the one who came back to Jesus to give thanks, and acknowledge every gift from God which we sometimes fail to see and appreciate.

      As Thanksgiving approaches, let this be the year, when being grateful, becomes a way of life and not just something we do on a designated day.

     When we begin to make a habit of being grateful, we will find that God’s peace will reign in our hearts and we will become a people of joy!    

     “This is the day the Lord has made; let us be glad and rejoice in it. You are my God, and I give thanks to You; O my God, I extol You. Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His kindness endures forever (Ps 118: 24, 28-29).