Walk With me on Our Journey: We belong to God and are Each Other's keeper: Sometimes it takes longer to find out!

Dear Family of Love!

Happy Thanksgiving and Being Thoughtful and Thankful Thursday ! I want to wish everyone the happiest of all Thanksgivings! I thank God for you this day and always. Holidays are never easy for those of us who have suffered loss and great change in our lives. My heart is tender this day remembering my family members who now reside in the Thin Places. Lots of memories come flooding back along with tears. Getting used to tears and new normals yet again are still in the raw and fresh meat stage. Grief in the first year has a feeling of numbness and the second year makes one feel tender and out of whack. This is one of these years. I did have fun with my parish family and had Thanksgiving Dinner. It was the first time I have ever done this. I was planning on eating at the Santa Maria Inn and had a reservation. On Monday I had started thinking that I might as well sign up for the dinner. I made the right decision. I didn't feel that bad lonely feeling I had last Christmas when I had Christmas Dinner alone. For many years I didn't feel like I belonged anywhere But this year I truly did. This is a gift from God We all should have a sense and knowledge of being wanted and belonging. No one needs to feel alone, lonely, isolated, and invisible. We all need to be encircled with a warm quilt of love and belonging. As I look at it what our world needs now more than ever is that sense of belonging not based on fear but love, camaraderie, familyhood, and deep acceptance and understanding. We see in the news and in Social Media the need to cower together with fear, hate, and lack of trust. This my dear family is why extremism in all its forms drives a dangerous bus and is very harmful. We don't start off being extremists, racists, all ists, phobias, and phobics, We develop these conditions due to conditioning by groups, members of our own family,and the like because it is easier to hate, loathe, bully, and fear. Keeping CALM -(Compassionate, Accepting, Loving, and Merciful ) requires,, no, demands that each of us put our egos and agendas aside and as they said in Star Trek "Boldly go where no one had gone before!" So dear family on this Thanksgiving day are you prepared to "Boldly Go " and encircle the world, inflame your hearts, with love, inclusion, and making sure that everyone is made to feel welcome and that they no longer are invisible and belong?
Take time this night to give thanks and pray and ask yourself this question.

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God help us to know and feel that we are yours and belong to you and are each other's keeper. Help us to recognize this sooner rather than later.

God we pray this night for all of our family members who don't have a sense of belonging and that we keep an eye on them so that they don't fall through the cracks and resort to joining negative and dangerous groups just to try to fit in.

God we pray that as we who grieve may establish new normals that feed our souls, give us warmth, and that will soothe our tender hearts.

God we pray for peace in this world that compassion, acceptance, love and mercy may enfold each of our family members in a blanket of unity.

God we pray for our family members who are lost, lonely, alone, and feel invisible that we may bring them in and love them as you love them and as you love us.

God we pray that we may learn and educate ourselves on the history of holidays and that we may be sensitive to all indigenous peoples and seek to be forgiven of the wrongs we have committed.

God we pray and give thanks to you for our many blessings especially__________________

God we pray these prayers from the BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER

For the Poor and the Neglected

Almighty and most merciful God, we remember before you
all poor and neglected persons whom it would be easy for us
to forget: the homeless and the destitute, the old and the sick,
and all who have none to care for them. Help us to heal those
who are broken in body or spirit, and to turn their sorrow
into joy. Grant this, Father, for the love of your Son, who for
our sake became poor, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

. For the Oppressed

Look with pity, O heavenly Father, upon the people in this
land who live with injustice, terror, disease, and death as
their constant companions. Have mercy upon us. Help us to
eliminate our cruelty to these our neighbors. Strengthen those
who spend their lives establishing equal protection of the law
and equal opportunities for all. And grant that every one of
us may enjoy a fair portion of the riches of this land; through
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

For our Enemies
O God, the Father of all, whose Son commanded us to love
our enemies: Lead them and us from prejudice to truth;
deliver them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in
your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Thanksgiving Day

Almighty and gracious Father, we give you thanks for the
fruits of the earth in their season and for the labors of those
who harvest them. Make us, we pray, faithful stewards of
your great bounty, for the provision of our necessities and
the relief of all who are in need, to the glory of your Name;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with
you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

A Prayer attributed to St. Francis
Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is
hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where
there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where
there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where
there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to
be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is
in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we
are born to eternal life. Amen.

A General Thanksgiving

Accept, O Lord, our thanks and praise for all that you have
done for us. We thank you for the splendor of the whole
creation, for the beauty of this world, for the wonder of life,
and for the mystery of love.

We thank you for the blessing of family and friends, and for
the loving care which surrounds us on every side.

We thank you for setting us at tasks which demand our best
efforts, and for leading us to accomplishments which satisfy
and delight us.

We thank you also for those disappointments and failures
that lead us to acknowledge our dependence on you alone.

Above all, we thank you for your Son Jesus Christ; for the
truth of his Word and the example of his life; for his steadfast
obedience, by which he overcame temptation; for his dying,
through which he overcame death; and for his rising to life
again, in which we are raised to the life of your kingdom.
Grant us the gift of your Spirit, that we may know him and
make him known; and through him, at all times and in all
places, may give thanks to you in all things. Amen.

For the Diversity of Races and Cultures
O God, who created all peoples in your image, we thank you
for the wonderful diversity of races and cultures in this world.
Enrich our lives by ever-widening circles of fellowship, and
show us your presence in those who differ most from us, until
our knowledge of your love is made perfect in our love for all
your children; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

God we lift up these our prayers in the name of Jesus the Christ our brother, friend, healer, redeemer and reconciler and role model of how we should live, move, and just be. May we be living examples of spreading the Good News and Shining God's Light to the world with compassion, acceptance, love, and mercy. Amen.

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Good Night Dear Ones! May you wake up happy in the morning and be ready to Keep the Faith on Friday Fearlessly Without Fretting! I love you and give God thanks for you this day and always.

With love and gratitude,

Sara