Another Thanksgiving has come and gone, and I hope everyone had a beautiful and wonderful day with family and friends. On Wednesday, I made a five-hour drive back to my home town of Cochranton where my dad lives to spend Thanksgiving with him and my grandma. His fiancee and her three daughters also visited, along with my aunt, uncle, and cousin and her boyfriend, and some other visitors. All in all, we had twelve people sitting a big table in our living room enjoying each others company and some great food.
The big focus of my thanks this year (which also seemed to be the theme among others), is the ability to be able to do what I did yesterday: having family and friends around me; having food on the table; having a roof over my head. There are so many people around the world who cannot do these things on a daily basis, and in our culture of over-consumption, we tend to miss that. I'm not saying that we should eat as minimally as possible on Thanksgiving as a reminder of those people, but we should be grateful to God that He's given us these blessings and, in some way, to share them with those who are less fortunate.
I read an article this morning in the Meadville Tribune, which is a local paper I had growing up, about a community Thanksgiving dinner held in Meadville yesterday. This dinner has been going on for many decades by the Family & Community Christian Association, and each year they have new volunteers come and old ones return; some who have been helping with the dinner for almost 20 to 30 years. This dinner, the organization said, is not meant to be just a charitable event for those who are going without, but it's open to everyone at different stages in life; for those who couldn't make it to spend time with their families, or maybe those who wanted to spend time with others on the holiday. The goal of meal is to let people know that they don't have to be alone on the holiday.
Near the end of the article, I was impressed by the reason one woman and her mother decided to volunteer. She said work schedules got in the way of traveling to see other family, so at first, her and her mother were going to just do Thanksgiving together. Then, they had an idea to volunteer at the FCCA dinner. She said it was a wonderful experience and to see everyone come together in fellowship, and they learned a lot from all of the veteran volunteers.
This really made me think about what I would've done if I hadn't went home or went to see other family. I know my friend Kyle offered for me to come with his family I had nowhere to go. But, what if I didn't have an offer to go somewhere? Would I have locked myself up in my apartment? To be quite honest, I don't think volunteering for something like a community Thanksgiving dinner would've ever crossed my mind, and I've never imagined being absolutely alone for any holiday. Have you ever thought about this? What would you do if you had nowhere to go over the holidays?
On a different note: one thing that keeps bothering me a little more every year is Black Friday. We go from spending the day in fellowship with our families and friends (for the most part), and then we mob each other while shopping to get the hottest deals and best buys for the holiday season. Is that what it's really all about? I'm appalled to hear stories every year about people getting trampled to death in malls as people crash the doors to stores, and fist fights breaking out over whether or not people get the last great item on the shelves. This year, I noticed the "Black Friday deals" were starting as early as 10 PM Thanksgiving night, and then stores would have more sales starting in the early hours of the morning. Seriously? Sooner or later, Thanksgiving will turn into Black Thursday; they already have "Cyber Monday" in the following week.
Please, please, please remember why we celebrate these end of the year holidays. To me, it's appropriate that Thanksgiving occurs on the fourth Thursday of November every year. In the Church, it's the end of the liturgical year, and we'll be starting Advent either the following weekend or the weekend after. We can reflect on the past year in the Church and remember our growth and our struggles, and we can give thanks to God for being with us all along the way. Something that I noticed a couple of years ago is that the Advent season tends to get lost in the Christmas retail shuffle. Last year, I decided to treat Advent like I would Lent; I abstained from meat during the whole season in anticipation of the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ, and it opened my eyes to just how amazing the Advent season is! Advent is the period of waiting and expectation, where we long for the coming of our Savior into the world.
Take these ideas as food for thought, and remember "the reason for the season"!
Laus Deo!
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