Before There Was Enough

Homily – Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A) 

Isaiah 55:1–3 • Romans 8:35, 37–39 • Matthew 14:13–21 

2 August 2026 

Fr. Ricky Cañet Montañez, AA 

Many years ago, while I was pursuing my postgraduate studies in London, I spent three months as chaplain in a hospice, temporarily filling in for a Jesuit priest who had gone on vacation. He had been caring for the dying for many years and needed time to rest and renew his strength. Looking back, I can honestly say that those three months profoundly changed my understanding of gratitude. 

I spent many afternoons visiting patients who knew they were nearing the end of their earthly journey. I also became acquainted with several of the nurses and caregivers, some of whom were Filipinos. One day, I asked one of the nurses, “What have the dying taught you?” She paused before answering. “Father,” she said, “people rarely say, ‘I wish I had earned more money.’ They rarely talk about missed promotions or bigger houses. More often they say, ‘I wish I had appreciated what I already had.’ They remember ordinary dinners with the family, the voice of a husband or wife, the laughter of their children, Sunday mornings together, the days when they could walk without pain. Only as these blessings slipped away did they realize they had been living amid countless gifts.” 

That conversation has remained with me because it revealed one of the deepest tendencies of the human heart: we postpone gratitude. We tell ourselves that we will be thankful when life gets better—when the medical results are reassuring, when the children are finally settled, when the bills are paid, when our worries disappear. We postpone gratitude to a future that never quite seems to arrive. In the meantime, we worry, we complain, and occupy ourselves by envying others who have what we want. 

The Gospel today offers us a very different way of living. When the disciples saw the crowd, they immediately counted what was lacking. Five loaves and two fish could never feed thousands. Their calculation was correct, but it was not complete. Jesus looked at those same five loaves and two fish, raised His eyes to heaven, said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples (Matthew 14:19). It is an easily overlooked detail, yet it changes everything. Jesus gave thanks before there was enough. Not after, but before. The miracle did not begin when the bread was multiplied. It began when Jesus looked up to heaven and gave thanks. Most of us assume gratitude is the result of abundance. Jesus teaches that gratitude is the beginning of abundance. 

Think of two people driving home after a long day at work. They are caught in the same traffic, exhausted by the same demands, and worried by the same rising prices. One spends the journey complaining about the delay, cursing other drivers on the road, and eventually arrives home hot-headed and grumpy. The other reaches home just as tired but says, “I’m grateful I still have work, people waiting for me at home, and another day that God has given me.” Nothing outside them has changed. The traffic is the same. The fatigue is the same. The burdens are the same. The only difference lies in the disposition of their hearts. Gratitude does not necessarily change our circumstances; it changes the way we see them and deal with them.

The First Reading speaks the same language of grace. Through the prophet Isaiah, the Lord says, “Come, all you who are thirsty… come… without money and without price” (Isaiah 55:1). God does not wait until we have enough before He blesses us. His generosity always comes first. Before we deserve anything, He opens His hands in generosity and invites us to receive. He gives without asking for payment. He only asks that we turn to Him, for only He can truly satisfy the deepest hunger of the human heart. 

That is why, in our Second Reading, St. Paul proclaims his unwavering confidence in God’s love and providence. How can we not be grateful when nothing can separate us from God’s love? His answer is one of the most beautiful professions of faith in the New Testament: nothing—not hardship, not distress, not suffering, not even death—will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:38–39). St. Paul reminds us that no trial we face will ever be faced apart from the love of Christ. With such a promise, how can our hearts fail to be grateful? 

It is no coincidence that the heart of our worship is the Eucharist — a word that literally means “thanksgiving”. Every time we gather for Mass, we come with unfinished lives. Some carry illness, others bear grief, financial worries, family struggles, or prayers that remain unanswered. And yet, before anything changes, we gather and give thanks. That is not wishful thinking; it is an act of faith. It is choosing to trust, as Jesus did, that God’s love is already present even when His blessings have not yet fully unfolded. 

I often think of those patients in the hospice. Many of them discovered too late that what they had called ordinary had been extraordinary all along. Let us not wait until the end of our lives to make the same discovery. Before asking God today for what is still missing, let us thank Him for what is already in our hands: the people who love us, the strength to begin another day, the faith that has brought us to this Eucharist, and the quiet assurance that nothing can separate us from His love. May God give us hearts that recognise and appreciate the blessings from His unparalleled generosity.