All our hungers

I have so many things for which to be thankful in my life.  I have a beautiful, bright daughter who amazes me with her grace and creativity, a spunky step-daughter who keeps me on my toes (and keeps sweet treats on the table), a partner who loves me for who I am and yet knows how to challenge me to be even more truly myself, a perfect job where I have found a professional home like no other, a lovely house where my every comfort is within arms reach, a sister and dad who are loving and kind and in-laws (well outlaws since it ain’t legal in Georgia) who are gentle and generous beyond measure.  For all these things and the health of this mortal coil I give great thanks.  But as is my way, I can not blindly enjoy my blessings without an eye to those in the world who are hungry in a myriad of ways. As we hustle and hurry to fill our shopping carts with every last ingredient for a happy Thanksgiving let us pause to think of, pray about and commit to engage the hungers experienced in the world around us.

Hunger for food

Hunger for family

Hunger for friends

Hunger for peace

Hunger for justice

Hunger for kindness

Hunger for love

As we settle in at tables where we are warm, welcome and well fed, let us remember in our prayers:

Those who are not welcome at the table of their birth – who have been denied the open doors, wide smiles and warm hugs of a holiday homecoming.

Those who will visit your table and be wrapped in the extravagant hospitality and yet know, secretly behind their laughter and gratitude, that they are just a step outside warm glow of your tribe.

Those who will relish the solitude and freedom to think, feel, do and eat without the hairy eyebrow of judgement.

Those whose tables are cold with hunger – who went to sleep on streets with no tables or sit down to tables with mere scraps of meals gone by.

Those who struggle with their relationship to food – who avoid the tables groaning under the weight of a million gravy laden atoms that threaten to undo them once more.

Those who will wander in to a Waffle House to have a cup of coffee with a weary waitress.

Those who will while away the hours in solitude floating on a chemical high as the parade passes them by.

Those who will eat food plopped from institutional cans onto sterile trays – elbow to elbow with inmates.

Those who will not sleep tonight, who will eat last tomorrow so that tummies at shelters, in church basements, on street corners and in our very own homes will be full.

Lord in your mercy…