Have a Grateful Thanksgiving and a Reflective Day of Mourning

You might be wondering, what a 'reflective day of mourning' means, on a day that we know typically as the American celebration of Thanksgiving. Well, the Native American Indians know this day to be their 'national day of mourning', mourning for the genocide in part of so many of their people's [ancestors and the crimes still continue today, in Central America and in South Americas, and many in America are still hunted down like animals, women in particular, with impunity in several states and in Canada.]

For me personally, this day is one of thanks, but one of sadness too, and this is because there were several years [off and on] that I spent this day, with my daughter, once while pregnant, as a Homeless [and working mind you] Woman. I have not forgotten, and I think often that I am not doing enough to help, the thousands that I know are still homeless and the numbers are growing. I STILL to this day, suffer from a form of post-traumatic stress, I say a form...its not as severe as lets say, one who suffers ptsd from war, but there is the living with survivor guilt and the constant fear and insecurity that is often paralyzing...being 'homeless' and pregnant with child with another small child, with no help, in a strange city, is in itself, traumatic....I haven't forgotten

the 'shame', that part is the hardest and it had a lot to do with Why I did get involved with radical politics. It was a BRUTAL EYE AWAKENING....having lived in a rural small conservative Bible Belt town, having heard the usual American 'positive' Disney World Christianity, and then seeing, the REALITY, what the streets is like, the discrimination and prejudice [and particularly from so called religious folk and yea, some leftist folk too], and seeing life, from the perspective of 'looking up from the gutter' rather than looking at it from the sides [or the top],

well, it does something to you, and you are

NEVER, THE SAME AGAIN.

You can't go back to how it used to be, because even if you do, you don't forget...what it is, what the 'being on the inside' of the 'outside' is, the underground, as we street people call it. To be truly 'invisible' and 'without value' in a society where value is placed on 'the goods one possesses'. That includes, moral value.

And it might be for this reason, that I today, think on the millions in our world, who do not have homes and worse, who do not have hope. Those who wake up to bombs and rapes and torture and abuse. Those who are born only to cry in a world that has no sympathy for their pain, no God for them...not one they hear about that is,

and as I cook today, in our mobile with my children and husband, listening to the Christian radio, I can't help but think,

how surreal this all is to me, and how, I don't really 'deserve' it because I haven't lived a sinless or righteous life, and how unfair it is, really,
that here I am, with food, shelter, family, safety,

and for millions, they will only know these things as a 'dream'.

And I reflect on the Words of Jesus, when he said, 'woe to you who are rich now, woe to you who are full now and do not hunger',

and these words haunt me. I am not rich according to American standards [and in fact am in lifetime of debt] but, as for the rest of the world, I am stinking rich.

Today, I reflect, that I'm not happy anymore, just writing about it, this has been in fact, haunting me for some time [for years actually], I want to do more,

just, can't, right now, THOUGH I am working to Change that so that I can. But the desire doesn't go away, I think of the girls in Afghanistan and the people in prisons in Iran and the Christian women raped and shot for feeding their kids in North Korea and I think...

there Has to be more to life than this, to this feasting and celebrating...there just has to be.

And for me, you see, I have no excuse, because I know, those feelings of helplessness, but even then, there was 'hope'. For millions, there isn't,

but WE can be their hope, can't we? Aren't WE, supposed to be the light for them in this dark world? Isn't that,

what Christianity, is really all about?

So, friends, today, I say, when we gather round the meals, when we give Thanks to our Lord for His blessings, that WE also, take time, to Reflect, for those, who today,

MOURN.

And that, we walk away today...wake up tomorrow, with a decision, to LIVE OUT, what Christ commanded...

to give water, to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to release the captives, to visit the prisoner and to comfort the broken hearted,

to bring healing to our broken world. And to not just to those near us, but to those, far away, that they too,

can one day, reflect, that somewhere, someone saw them, someone heard God's calling, and they were not invisible anymore, and that yes, there is

HOPE.

Most of all, there is

LOVE.

They won't see, if we 'keep our security' and do not, lose our lives, for the Lord and the Gospel. And when we do, and a soul without hope is saved,
there is another celebration of Thanksgiving,

the angels around the throne of God, who Rejoice, who give Thanks, that we, obey the great commission we were given, in whatever call He has called us.

and that, I feel, is what Thanksgiving, is really, about.

Love, Peace to you all today,

Jane