Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash
I'm not sure how this happened... but suddenly Thanksgiving is in a week!
I'm sure you've noticed. The commercials and storefronts and grocery store deals on turkey and stuffing are all dead giveaways. :)
I'm sure you've also noticed that in celebrating this particular holiday, and during the month of November as a whole, the emphasis is always placed on that first word -- thanks. We're always talking about being thankful for what we have. When we speak about giving, it's usually only in the context of giving thanks, i.e. sharing what it is we're grateful for.
Gratitude is a vital habit of the heart to cultivate.
But so is the habit of giving.
The deacon at my parish put it so well in his homily at Mass this past weekend. The Gospel was the story from Mark 12:41-44 about the widow who put everything she had, "worth a few cents," we're told, into the treasury. Jesus praises her for giving from her poverty rather than her surplus.
The deacon said that there are three types of givers:
- Grudge givers give because they have to.
- Duty givers give because they ought to.
- Thanks givers give because they want to.
But more often than I'd like to admit, I don't give at all. I tell myself that on a graduate student budget, I don't have much of a surplus to give from.
But is that really all that Jesus asks for? My money?
I think we can interpret the widow's "poverty" in last Sunday's Gospel in a few ways. In a literal sense, she has limited financial resources. But what resources do I see myself lacking? Where can I give from my poverty? And where can I do so in joy?
The most resounding and all-encompassing answer for me involves time, that elusive resource we all seem to be running low on, constantly.
I don't have much. But I have fifteen minutes to be fully present with a student who is struggling, instead of working on my own projects.
I don't have much. But I have a half hour to call my grandpa, instead of indulging in a surplus of Netflix episodes.
I don't have much. But I have an hour to treat a friend to coffee and to receive her in her sorrow and joy.
I don't have much. But I can trade the surplus of time I spend surfing the internet in the morning and offer it to God in prayer instead.
...And, when the opportunity calls, I can even spend the $25 I was going to put toward a new t-shirt on donating to a charity instead. Even a graduate student budget can afford to do that. :)
Here's to giving, more often, from our poverty. Here's to giving, more often, from thankful, joyful hearts.
Here's to giving thanks.
And to thanks giving.
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