As our brothers and sisters in the United States celebrate Thanksgiving - a prayer of joyful gratitude for the blessings and beauty of the world around us.
O
God, we thank you for this earth, our home;
For
the wide sky and the blessed sun,
For
the salt sea and the running water,
For
the everlasting hills
And
the never-resting winds,
For
trees and the common
grass
underfoot.
We
thank you for our senses
By
which we hear the
songs
of birds,
And
see the splendor of
the
summer fields,
And
taste of the autumn fruits,
And
rejoice in the feel of the snow,
And
smell the breath of the spring.
Grant
us a heart wide open to all this beauty;
And
save our souls from being so blind
That
we pass unseeing
When
even the common thornbush
Is
aflame with your glory,
O
God our creator,
Who
lives and reigns for ever and ever.
Walter Rauschenbusch
Happy Thanksgiving!
