Clergy Notes — Thanksgiving Sunday October 9 2022

This Thanksgiving weekend we give thanks for the harvest, the fruit of creation, and celebrate with family and friends. Tradition has it that the first Europeans to settle in North America gave thanks at their first harvest for their arrival and first year’s survival in what was to them a new world.

As we continue in our journey of Truth and Reconciliation, in Canada we, Indigenous and Settler peoples, do well to reflect more deeply on Thanksgiving: for the harvest, yes, but more than that, on the Creator’s gift of the land, the good earth, on which we live, work, and play. Our sharing and enjoyment of the land has a long and often painful history, which is acknowledged in the Salal+Cedar Eucharistic Prayer we use this Sunday:

 

 “It is right in all times and in all places to thank and praise you Creator of all.

We praise you here where the Fraser River meets the Salish Sea,

where city and farm, wilderness and industry are side by side.

We praise you at a time when the body of earth is broken again and again.

We give thanks for our place in the story of salvation.

Our ancestors journeyed with you in creation and migration.

They depended on the land,

were displaced from the land

and displaced others from their lands.

They knew you in tents and cities,

on mountains and by wells, in families and in dreams,

and through wilderness prophets who spoke of cedars and listened to ravens.”

As we have bound ourselves to walk together in this land, it is incumbent on Settlers like myself to acknowledge the richness of Indigenous culture which for so long our forebears sought to suppress.

Elder Kelvin Bee, who was sharing last weekend in his Nation’s marking of Truth and Reconciliation Day, will help us reflect on how we at St. James’ have set out together on this journey.

Every blessing,

Fr. Kevin

 

Download the Sunday service booklet here: Liturgy at Home Pentecost 18 Thanksgiving October 9 2022