There seemed to be only one snag to Christmas when I was young: you had to write thank-you letters to the relatives who gave you Christmas presents. Sometimes it was all the harder if you did not like the present of stockings some aunt had given you. My mother showed rare wisdom when she explained that the people who gave me presents did so because they really liked me and I was only acknowledging their love. Like all youngsters I liked being liked, and I wrote the letters with more grace, even if I felt sending me stockings was a curious way of showing they loved me!
I was considerably older before I applied that piece of wisdom to God. God had been showering my life with his gifts for years before it occurred to me that his gifts were his ways of saying he too liked me. It was a wonderful surprise and suddenly I became much more aware of the many, many gifts God had given me in the course of my life. So I am always delighted when our readers write to thank God for listening to their fervent prayers. I am especially delighted to think that they too have made the discovery that God is revealing his love of them in answering their prayers. How often they write that they have long intended to write their letter of thanksgiving but only got around to it now. Or is it only now that they have made the connection between the gift and the Giver of all gifts who shows his love by sending good things into our lives?
St. Ignatius thought this was an excellent way to pray. He advised everyone, and especially his Jesuit sons, to pause briefly twice a day to recollect how God has been in their lives that day. Ignatius knew that if we did not look out for his gifts we might easily overlook them. But he was certain the gifts were there, if we only had eyes to see them. This habit can lead you to look for significant gifts in your life: It is a great revelation at the time of a wedding for the couple to realise that God has been preparing the love-of-their-lives for them from all eternity!
In a time when we are acutely aware of what we have lost through the greed of our fellow men, it is more important to count your blessing and hold on to the reassurance that you are precious in the eyes of God. As the poet wrote: I greet him the day I meet him and bless when I understand.
John Looby, S.J., Editor