Faces on Faith: You are what you eat
The church I served in Westport, Connecticut, has hosted a Community Thanksgiving Feast for decades. Hundreds of folks every year enjoy music played by local musicians, and eat turkey with all the trimmings. Dozens of volunteers shop and cook and set tables. Dozens more procure donations and clean up after the last guest leaves.
For several years some of the finest support for the feast came from the kids at two local schools. The middle-school kids raised a significant sum of money to help underwrite the feast. The elementary-school children made table decorations and cards for each person who attends. I just love reading the cards! They were often quite witty, and truly come from the heart.
One of the cards one year featuring a turkey on orange construction paper read: “Dear Best Bud, Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you have a blast. From Eliana.”
Another, decorated with colorful feathers was very politically correct: “Dear He or She,” it began, “I hope you have a good Thanksgiving.”
A girl named Blythe must have been told by her teacher that some of the guests at the feast come simply because they were all alone and wanted some company. Her card, with an adorable brown turkey on blue construction paper, read: “Dear Friend, Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you can find a friend after Thanksgiving so you can have a friend before the next Thanksgiving.”
Most of the cards, though, focused on the meal itself. Alyssia wrote: “Have a Happy Thanksgiving. Eat a lot of turkey.” And Jayan got right to the point: “Eat all the turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy and pumpkin pie, even if you have to stuff yourself.”
Across the nation, many many churches and community groups hold similar Thanksgiving meals. Most anyone and everyone can get enough to eat on Thanksgiving. But we must do more.
Following a sermon I once preached in that same Westport church, I spoke about the importance of doing whatever we can to help those in need. I talked about how God calls each one of us, rich or poor, young or old, to live lives in service to others. I said that no matter who we are, there is something we can do to help out those in need.
Among those sitting in the congregation that morning were some folks representing Habitat for Humanity. The delegation included members of the family living in a Habitat house. After the service, the mother of the family told us that she had been stirred by my call to action. She knew that some of the other Habitat families didn’t have enough to eat, so she was going to organize a food collection among the Habitat families to help out their hungry peers. She is doing what she can to help.
So what can you do to help? Can you collect food for our pantries? Can you volunteer at F.I.S.H. or the Harry Chapin Food Bank? Can you give financial support to their work? Can you educate yourself about hunger issues here in the United States and around the world? Can you write our leaders in Tallahassee and Washington and urge them to make hunger issues a top priority?
Thanksgiving is a time to express our gratitude, but it is also a time to act!
The Rev. Dr. John H. Danner is the senior pastor at Sanibel Congregational United Church of Christ.