Donuts

HOMILY NOTES

FR. TERRY RYAN, CSP

MATTHEW 22: 15-21

OCTOBER 22, 2017

I am in a parish in the Texas Hill Country.  The people are very nice to me and prayerful, but they do not have donuts after mass.  Can it be a real Catholic parish without donuts after mass?  Are these people into suffering and fasting?  They do have donuts one Sunday a month.  That is their Catholic Sunday.  Unfortunately, I am not here on that Sunday.  Inside me, where there should be a donut being digested, I am whining and grumbling.  I cannot do this out loud, publicly, or then people will know I am not holy.  Priests must appear holy at least.  Then the gospel hits me over the head.  What do I owe God?  I owe God gratitude.  I have God’s love, my faith, sacraments, my priesthood and this wonderful hill country with its cool Fall weather.  

I so focus on what I do not have, which is usually insignificant.  I forget to be thankful for what I do have, and thus take things for granted.  So now I am trying to express gratitude.  How do I do that?  Well, do something kind for someone else, something that might take something from me for someone else.  And don’t worry about the results.  That is up to God.  An example is when I am in a public space, sitting down, such as on a bus or at an airport waiting for the plane.  Why take up two seats, one for me and one for my “stuff.”  While others stand around waiting, my stuff has a seat.  Convenient for me, plus I don’t have to worry about sitting with a terorist or other crazy person.  But it is selfish and self-centered to take up all that space.  Put my stuff on my lap or on the dirty floor and leave the seat vacant.  It is not for me to worry about who sits in it, if anyone.  

When on a check-out line, when I have lots of stuff in my basket and the person behind me has but one or two things, why not let them go in front.  I practice letting go, kindness, and neighborliness, not to say selflessness.  These are the ways to cooperate with God in my own transformation so that I will become a follower of Jesus and not simply a believer with Catechism answers to theological questions.