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Happy Thanksgiving from everyone at IgnatiusInsight.com!

Thanksgiving is a time-honored and cherished
American tradition, rooted in the Christian belief that God is the source
of all life and goodness, deserving our humble thanks and praise.
Here is a selection of thoughts and prayers from
some Ignatius Press books and authors about thanksgiving and gratitude.
They have helped me to reflect more deeply on the importance and necessity
of thanksgiving. I hope you enjoy them.
Have a blessed and happy Thanksgiving!
Carl Olson
Editor, IgnatiusInsight.com

"What great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our
God is to us, whenever we call upon him?" (Deut 4:7)
"Saint Thomas Aquinas took up this saying in his reflections for the Feast
of Corpus Christi. In doing so, he showed how we Christians in the Church
of the New Covenant can pronounce these words with yet more reason and more
joy and with thankfulness than Israel could in doing so, he showed how this
saying , in the Church of Jesus Christ, has aqquired a depth of meaning
hitherto unsuspected; God has truly come to dwell among us in the Eucharist."
- From God
Is Near Us: The Eucharist, The Heart of Life by Joseph Cardinal
Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI).
A
Psalm for the thank offering:
Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the lands!
Serve the LORD with gladness! Come into his presence with singing!
Know that the LORD is God! It is he that made us, and we are his; we are
his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks
to him, bless his name!
For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures for ever, and his faithfulness
to all generations. (Psalm 100 [99])
- From the Ignatius
Bible, RSVCE
"Gratitude is a species of justice."
"The chief security against the fruitless anguish of impatience, must arise
from frequent reflection on the wisdom and goodness of the God of nature,
in whose hands are riches and poverty, honour and disgrace, pleasure and
pain, and life and death. A settled conviction of the tendency of every
thing to our good, and of the possibility of turning miseries into happiness,
by receiving them rightly, will incline us to bless the name of the Lord,
whether he gives or takes away."
- From The Quotable Johnson: A Topical Compilation
of His Wit and Moral Wisdom edited by Stephen C. Danckert
"Grace
is always given to those ready to give thanks for it" (Thomas À Kempis).
"Be loving and thankful to God for the least benefits that He gives you,
and then you will be better prepared and more worthy to receive greater
benefits from Him. Think that the least gift that he gives is great, and
take the meanest things as special gifts and as great tokens of love. If
the dignity of the Giver is well considered, no gift will seem little."
(Thomas À Kempis)
"That we must recognize and acknowledge every good as a gift and that even
the patient endurance of suffering for Christ's sake is of God. That we
should not accept in silence the benefactions of God, but return thanks
for them." (Rule 55 from St. Basil)
"And let those who will, laugh and scorn--I shall not be silent; nor shall
I hide the signs and wonders which the Lord has shown me many years before
they came to pass, as He knows everything even before the times of the
world. Hence I ought unceasingly to give thanks to God Who often pardoned
my folly and my carelessness, and on more than one occasion spared His great
wrath on me, who was chosen to be His helper and who was slow to do as was
shown me and as the Spirit suggested. And the Lord had mercy on me thousands
and thousands of times..." (St. Patrick)
"...We are led to give thanks to God, because seeing that God is the Creator
of all things, it is certain that all that we are, and all that we have
come from God: hence the Apostle says: What hast thou that hou hast not
received?--The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and
all that dwell therein. For which reason we owe Him thanksgiving:
What shall I render unto the Lord for all the things that he has rendered
to me?" (St. Thomas Aquinas)
- From The
Treasury of Catholic Wisdom, edited and with an introduction by
John A. Hardon, S.J.
Act
of Thanksgiving after Communion
" I give Thee thanks, holy Lord, Father almighty, everlasting God, Who has
vouchsafed to feed me, a sinner, Thine unworthy servant, for no merits of
my own, but only out of the goodness of Thy great mercy, with the precious
Body and Blood of Thy Son, our Lord Jesus Christ; and I pray Thee, that
this holy Communion may be to me, not guilt for punishment, but a saving
intercession for pardon. Let it be to me an armor of faith and a shield
of good will. Let it be to me a casting out of vices; a driving away of
all evil desires and fleshly lusts; an increase in charity, patience, humility,
obedience, and all virtues; a firm defense against the plots of all my enemies,
both seen and unseen; a perfect quieting of all motions of sin, both in
my flesh and my spirit; a firm cleaving unto Thee, the only and true God,
and a happy ending to my life. And I pray Thee to deign to bring me, a sinner,
to that ineffable Feast, where Thou art withThy Son and the Holy Ghost,
art to Thy holy ones true light, full satisfaction, everlasting joy, consummate
pleasure and perfect happiness. Amen. (St.Thomas Aquinas)
From Adoration:
Eucharistic Texts and Prayers Throughout Church History, Compiled
by Daniel P. Guernsey
"The
hungry he has filled with good things." Luke 1:53
The second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary: In the first days of her pregnancy,
Mary visited her cousin Elizabeth's home. There it was that she sang the
"Magnificat." In this sudden song of the praise of God, she tells me a secret
about my soul's food: "God fills the hungry." Mary wanted God, hungered
after God, and God entrusted His Son to his care. God heaped "good things"
on the table of her heart--His Son Jesus, "the fruit of her womb," was divine
fruit for her soul.
"Christ in the Eucharist is my soul's food. Jesus fills my emptiness and
satisfies my insatiable hunger."
- From Father
Peyton's Rosary Prayer Book
"The
idea of a feast of thanksgiving has universal and venerable precedent. Gratitude
to God (or to gods: the powers that be) for the fruitfulness of the earth
is deeply rooted in the religious heart of man.
"The Jews had, and have today, three celebrations that are at least in part
agricultural festivals: Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles or Succoth.
Sacrifices were traditionally offered at the temple in thanksgiving for
the harvest and festive meals held.
"Christianity brought a new perspective to the ancient tradition. 'Eucharist'
itself means 'thanksgiving,' and God is thanked, sacrifice offered every
time the Eucharist is celebrated. This is why the eucharistic feast became
the fundamental Christian meal, imparting beauty and symbolism to all other
feasts."
"The thanksgiving banquet is, in all its many forms, a beautiful tradition."
- From A
Continual Feast: A cookbook to celebrate the joys of family and faith throughout
the Christian year by Evelyn Birge Vitz

"Now that we have a feel for prayer as an interpersonal contact/union of
slowly developing intimacy between the indwelling Trinity and the human
person, we are prepared to appreciate the rich variations in which this
relationship occurs.
.
"Thanksgiving: Closely akin to adoration and praise, and yet with an added
dimension, is heartfelt thanksgiving. Repeatedly the psalmist and the Church
hearken to our privilege and duty of expressing gratitude to the Father
for every good and perfect gift that descends from him (Jas 1:17). All of
us are to declare to this God an endless proclamation of thanksgiving (cf.
Ps 28:7; Col 3:15)."
- From Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M., Prayer
Primer: Igniting a Fire Within
Commenting
on the prayer of thanksgiving (CCC 2603, 2637-8):
"The evangelists have preserved. . . explicit prayers offered by Christ
during his public ministry" [Mt 11:25-27 and Lk 10:21-23]. "Each begins
with thanksgiving" (CCC 2603). The same is true of the prayer given in Jn
11:41-42.
It is always healing to our spirits to "count our blessings" and thank God
for everything that is good. It is also realistic, or honest to reality.
For whatever means he uses-nature, family, friends, our own talents-it is
God who is the First Cause of all life and goodness (and not of death and
sin). In the poorest life there are always immeasurable riches to thank
God for. Everyone's "blessing list" should include at least:
a. Life itself and time and family and friends and our own mental and spiritual
powers and the many little pleasures that are always available in this world;
b. our very existence; for the birth of each one of us was designed and
willed from eternity by the Creator (our parents were only our "pro-creators");
c. salvation from sin and the hope of heaven; that is, infinite and unimaginable
joy in intimate union with God forever;
d. God's patient, daily grace in making us holy and good and able to enjoy
him more in eternity. Even when we have few earthly gifts, we have God (sometimes,
only then!). "The Giver is more precious than the gift" (CCC 2604).
Our gratitude, too, should be Christocentric. If we do not feel grateful,
we should turn again to the crucifix. That is what God did for us. We should
practice giving thanks especially when we do not feel thankful, for that
is when we need to most. "Give thanks in all circumstances,- for this is
the will of God in Christ Jesus for you" (I Thess 5: 18).
- From Peter J. Kreeft, Catholic
Christianity: A Complete Catechism of Catholic Beliefs based on the
Catechism of the Catholic Church
After
this I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no man could number,
from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before
the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches
in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to
our God who sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb!" And all the angels stood
round the throne and round the elders and the four living creatures, and
they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, "Amen!
Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might
be to our God for ever and ever! Amen." Then one of the elders addressed
me, saying, "Who are these, clothed in white robes, and whence have they
come?" I said to him, "Sir, you know." And he said to me, "These are they
who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes
and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. (Revelation 7:9-14).
- From the Ignatius
Bible, RSVCE (Second Edition)
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