A Prayer for Thanksgiving

Dear God, source of all things, seen and unseen, your people are gathering to celebrate and give thanks.

Some of us are gathering with family, and so we give thanks for parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren, aunts, uncles, siblings, and cousins. We give you thanks for our familial bonds, and for the way we learn to see and love ourselves in the love we find among family. Comfort those among us for whom time with family is painful. Heal the wounds of estrangement and empower processes of reconciliation through forgiveness and repentance.

Some of us are gathering with friends, and so we give thanks for the family we choose. We give you thanks for those bonds in which we are free to be ourselves and to keep only the best parts of the traditions. Strengthen the bonds of community among friends.

Some of us are not gathering with anyone. We give you thanks that you are found chiefly among the widow and widower, the friendless, the outcast, and the lonely. Empower us to enfold all your people. Enrich our communities through the reintegration of those who have been cast out.

Some of us are gathering but find little to celebrate. We are mindful of the complicated origins of this holiday – empower us in our convictions to find reasons for gratitude. We are mindful of those who celebrate without loved ones who have died or who have been disappeared – empower us in our grief and heartbrokenness to heal your world. We are mindful of retail, service, travel, and hospitality workers working on the holiday – empower us in our solidarity to be kind… and to leave big tips!

We ask you, the one who became incarnate in the midst of all these things, to give us a spirit of gratitude and thanksgiving. Amen.