麻豆社

27 November<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

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Good Morning.

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Today in the United States of America is Thanksgiving Day. I find it interesting that it was in the teeth of a world war that President Franklin D Roosevelt signed a bill in November 1941 officially establishing this fourth Thursday in November as a fixed day for the national holiday for giving thanks.

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No one can be certain of its origin but the tradition of thankfulness stretches back to the times of the earliest colonies in the New World when post-harvest holidays were celebrated on the weekday regularly set aside as 鈥淟ecture Day鈥� which was basically a midweek church meeting.

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We鈥檝e hosted several Thanksgiving Day dinners in our home for young Americans who were visiting over the holidays. The first year we did so I remember one young woman introducing us to the practice of post-dinner thanksgiving. We moved round the table from person to person and each one of us was asked to mention something for which we were thankful in the past year.

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It struck me as such a simple and graceful thing to do. I realised how easy it is to flit through the days and weeks and months and years without pausing frequently enough to give a simple word of thanks.

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Thanksgiving Day exists to teach us how to live in the rest of the year. It is a reminder that gratefulness can be the settled pattern of our lives rather than a one day a year event.

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Heavenly Father, the giver of all good things, forgive us for our ungratefulness. Teach us today the grace of thanksgiving that we may live each day with a grateful heart. Amen