[thoughts on gratitude]

Thoughts in Solitude was my favorite book in my Faith in Contemporary Lit class with Debbie Pope five years ago when I was in Bible college in Kirkland. It still hasn't let go of me. Reading some of it this morning, it hit me again. As a friend of mine would say, "That's some good chicken." Enjoy, and may you walk in gratitude today. Be well, be blessed.

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There is no neutrality between gratitude and ingratitude. Those who are not grateful soon begin to complain of everything. Those who do not love, hate. In the spiritual life there is no such thing as an indifference to love or hate. That is why tepidity (which seems to be indifferent) is so detestable. It is hate disguised as love.

Tepidity, in which the soul is "neither hot nor cold" -- neither frankly loves nor frankly hates -- is a state in which one rejects God and rejects the will of God while maintaining an exterior pretense of loving him in order to keep out of trouble and save one's supposed self-respect. It is the condition that is soon arrived at by those who are habitually ungrateful for the graces of God. A man who truly responds to the goodness of God, and acknowledges all that he has received, cannot be a half-hearted Christian. True gratitude and hypocrisy cannot exist together. They are totally incompatible. Gratitude of itself makes us sincere -- or if it does not, then it is not true gratitude.

Gratitude, though, is more than a mental exercise, more than a formula of words. We cannot be satisfied to make a mental note of things which God has done for us and then perfunctorily thank him for favors received.

To be grateful is to recognize the love of God in everything He has given us -- and he has given us everything. Every breath we draw is a gift of his love, every moment of existence is a grace, for it brings with it immense graces from him. Gratitude therefore takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder and to praise of the goodness of God. For the grateful man knows that God is good, not by hearsay, but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference.

-Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude