Thanksgiving is Thanksliving

Customarily, on Thanksgiving Day almost everyone is thankful—except, of course, the turkey.

While you’re still smiling (or groaning), consider this confounding conundrum: Gratitude has a double focus; a person can be thankful for something, and also thankful to someone.

Imagine for a moment that you’re an atheist (God forbid it be a reality!). As a person joining in the holiday “thank-recital,” you might be thankful for good weather, for good health, for being still alive, etc. Yet, like the thankless turkey, you’re not thankful to anyone for such heaven-sent blessings. Of course you may be thankful for a gift and thankful to the giver—but only if the giver is human and not divine! That’s as discombobulating as the bumper sticker that says, “Thank God I’m an atheist!”

We may not realize how “de-personalized” our gratitude can become. If questioned, we’ll freely acknowledge God as the source of countless benefits and blessings, and even our very existence. Occasionally—such as Thanksgiving time—we may be “thankful for” our blessings, but far less often specifically “thankful to” our gracious and immensely beneficent Creator-God. Being “thankful to” him is not just enjoying his gifts, but acknowledging him as the Giver. By thus “personalizing” our God-focused gratitude we can sublimate our thankfulness into a fervent “prayer of thanksgiving.”

St. Bernard says that most Christians fail to realize that “any God-sent blessing left unacknowledged results in the Lord withholding many further blessings that would otherwise flood our soul.” And St. Theresa says that even very pious souls offend our Divine Benefactor by sins far more often than they thank him for his benefits. Even among devout Christians who seldom sin, most ask God for favors far more often than they give thanks for favors. Heaven re-echoes with “Please, Lord” far more than “Thanks, Lord!”

As a priest I receive many Mass requests of petition, but hardly ever for a Mass of thanksgiving. (“Eucharist” means thanksgiving!).

An example of this distorted mentality is found in the biblical event of Jesus’ healing of the ten lepers (Luke 17:11-19). All ten were certainly “thankful for” their healing, but only one returned to express “thanks to” the healer. All said please, but only one said thanks. All received physical healing; only one received the spiritual gift of joy from Jesus’ compliment: “Your faith has made you whole.”

To grow in gratitude it helps to survey its various levels. The first level is just being aware of God’s gifts; of course you can’t remember them all; just don’t forget them all. The second level is thanking God for all that you have, but also for not having many things you don’t have—leprosy, bankruptcy, a broken water heater, snakebite, or a cantankerous mother-in-law. The list is endless.

The third level is Paul’s mandate which transmutes the bitter into bittersweet: “Give thanks in all circumstances” (1 Thess. 5:18)—not for all circumstances like crime, war, sin, etc. But thank God for his positive or permissive will in everything—including every pain, cross or trial. Embrace the grace in life’s thorns, not just the roses. Life isn’t always a bowl of cherries—sometimes it’s the pits!

The fourth and highest level of gratitude is found in a phrase you recite in the Gloria at every Sunday Mass—most often parroted by rote: “We thank you for your glory.” That’s high-octane gratitude! Lower levels of thankfulness are simply gratitude for being gratified. This highest level of gratitude is totally selfless. You’re simply thanking God for being God! If you utter it truly from your heart—not just from your lips by liturgical rote—it will lift your soul to the stratosphere of divine love. That’s when thanksgiving segues into thanksloving, and, as St. John proclaims (1 John 4:16), it will then spill over into your life as thanksliving!