Thank you for your service!

 I grew up when (and I know that I am dating myself here, but that is no big deal!) words and phrases like, "Can I help you?" and "Please" and "Thank you" were rather commonplace. A shopping experience, for example, would often be interspersed with such phrases.

Out on the street a "Good Morning" or "Good Evening" or even a folksy "Howdy Neighbor" broke any silence.

Then, somehow, somewhere something began to change.

I cannot document its beginnings but, apparently, someone got the idea to get a bit more personable. And so a greeting was given.

"Have a nice day!"

And, behold! that greeting seemed to catch on like wildfire and it spread everywhere and under almost all circumstances.

Checkout clerks were inviting us to have that nice day and bank clerks were joining the chorus and, I suspect, even a pastor or two sent religious congregations out after a service inviting them to "Have a nice day!"

In fact I think that one of the few places where we were not told to "Have that nice day" was the funeral home.

Without much real thought, speaking out of force of habit, well wishers have invited us to that "Nice Day" even at eight in the evening.

It has become a greeting without much real significance or meaning.

And more recently a still newer phrase, limited in usage to be sure, has emerged.

"Thank you for your service."

With our growing fascination for the military and law inforcercers and public servants in general, there has now emerged that phrase of gratitude. We learn that the person alongside us served in Iraq, "Thank you for your service." A firefighter? Thank you . . .  Works the emergency room? Thank you . . .

The gratitude phrase is becoming commonplace and almost expected. Why, even Pat Sajak now says it on Wheel of Fortune when discovering a public servant.

And while the phrase is becoming commonplace and even in danger of becoming trite, I was caught by surprise recently. I was at a funeral. The Mass was soon to start and I was traversing from paying respects at the bier to my place for the coming time of prayer. I was clearly and evidently clergy. Had all the right attire for it. I could also be discerned as having a rather sufficient number of years behind me. The accumulation of years is evident.

And as I walked innocently from point A toward point B, one of the other participants in the event noticed me, stopped and surprised me with that greeting. "Thank you for your service, Father!"

It was a first and it was a surprise and, not ashamed to say it, it was a welcome blessing.

But then came the real surprise.

I don't know where this came from, probably one of those Holy Spirit moments, but, honestly, without giving thought or preparation to it, I responded. And I am very certain that my response surprised my greeter. I do know that it did surprise me.

"And thank you for being Church!" I responded.

Surprising! Certainly!

But true? Hopefully.

Is not that exactly what Christians, Disciples of Jesus, are to be all about? Should that not be the gratitude that each of us merits? Deserves?

Granted, there will be many in our world, in our time who will not be terribly grateful to be in the presence of those making the sincere effort to live as disciples of Jesus. There will be those who criticize, who tell us that we should keep our religious stuff to ourselves.

Thing is, though, that Jesus did come to reclaim this world and all of its flawed and failed social structures. He came to reclaim this world in the Name of its Rightful Owner. He came to establish the Kingdom of God and that will often go against the values that so many wish to live by.

Meekness? Mercy? Builders of peace? Foot-washers? Servants? Sisters and brothers? Walking the extra mile and turning the other cheek?

What sort of world would that be?

Well, perhaps it is time to try and find out.

Perhaps it is time to do the sort of things that just might cause someone to declare to us, "Thank you for being Church!" Perhaps it is time to take Jesus seriously in His teachings and not try and diminish their potency.

Another Lent is here.

Forget the candy and stuff like that, the stuff of our childhood.

How about giving up the things that are not "Of Church"?

And how about getting busy doing the things that enable us to be called "Church"?

How about a Forty Days that move in the direction of inviting someone, maybe THAT Someone to say to us, "Thank you for being Church."