Happy Thanksgiving

Gratitude ... goes beyond the "mine" and "thine" and claims the truth that all of life is a pure gift. In the past I always thought of gratitude as a spontaneous response to the awareness of gifts received, but now I realize that gratitude can also be lived as a discipline. The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy.

-Fr. Henri Nouwen

Let's try to make a point today, at least, of sharing some of that which we have so freely been given by our Creator.

A good spiritual exercise at the end of the day is to list off at least five things for which we are particularly grateful on that day.  In the morning, read the list from the previous night.  On both occasions, at morning at night, conclude the writing and the reading of your list of gratitude by making a short Act of Gratitude.  The Grace After Meals seems appropriate enough:

We give Thee thanks, Almighty God, for these and all Thy benefits which we have received from Thy bounty, through Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Happy Thanksgiving!