Thanksgiving November 25 2021

Thanksgiving is a beautiful word and a more beautiful action. In Spanish the name of this significant day is el Día de Acción de Gracias. This suggests more completely that giving thanks is a verb not a noun or simply a day or a thing. Thanksgiving is the verb; gratitude is the graceful noun!

In the scrambling over almost two years, there may have been more opportunities for fear, stress, and annoyances than for gratitude. These things always hold the risk of crowding out the state of heart necessary for gratitude — the quality of humility needed to authentically give thanks.

This Thanksgiving we here at RIWE and WP offer you and the entire Waldorf movement our thanks for the work that promises a noble future, bright with possibility, for young people who have the chance to rejoice in learning and being together with classmates. It also gives the Research Institute for Waldorf Education (RIWE), the Waldorf Online Library (OWL), and Waldorf Publications (WP) the chance for meaningful, abundant activity on behalf of all of you.  (What activity? Not a wonderful excuse to give thanks where thanks are due?)

Here are the words of a blessing song written by Elisabeth Kokkebacher, longtime music teacher at the Toronto Waldorf School. These simple words are a mighty reminder of the gift of good fortune! 

 For food in a world where many walk in hunger

For love in a world where many walk in fear

For friends in a world where many walk alone

We give thee humble thanks, Oh, Lord.

 

In the last line, you might want to substitute Allah, or Yahweh, or Mother Earth, or Great Universe, or simply state, “We give our humble thanks with joy.”  The message is the important reminder, you’ll discover, when you sing this or say this blessing.

At RIWE, at the OWL and at WP, we send you, our community, our thanks for the mighty work you are doing out there in the world, for your many gifts sent so generously, for the appreciation and purchases of our books, for your interest in our Research Bulletin, for your participation in our surveys when they appear.

Strong families, lively cheerful children who love to learn, tireless work to raise children in kind attentiveness, dedicated teaching, meditative preparation, and diligence in striving toward self-development, self-betterment—all these make a bright future — “The more beautiful world we know in our hearts is possible,” in the words of Charles Eisenstein.        

“For only when Love and Need are one, and the work is play for mortal stakes, Is the deed ever really done, for heaven’s and the future’s sakes.”
—Robert Frost