Every week in our church we take up an offering. It's good to remind ourselves from time to time that the offering is symbolic as well as practical. We know that it is through pledges that we build our budget and fund our yearly programs and ministries of worship and religious education, pay our...

Holy One, known by many names -- Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer -- you make your presence known to us in the sunshine of winter, in the dance of the flame, and in the lingering embrace of a trusted one. Fill us this day with your warmth, your power, your strength. Help us to see our lives with a...

Eternal God, Source of All Creation, we would give substance to our thankfulness by resolving to make right use of the gifts we have received from thy bounty. With thy gift of the senses we would fashion and preserve a world of beauty for all....

Eternal God, Mother and Father, Spirit of life, we gather grateful for the companionship of hearts and minds seeking to speak the truth in love. We gather grateful for our heritage, for the women and men before us whose prophetic words and deeds make possible our dreams and our insight. We gather...

We lift our hearts in gratitude for the gift of life, and praise the faithfulness of those who went before and set a pattern of excellence:...

On this both joyous and solemn day we have reason to celebrate; we have reason to be grateful; we have reason to be proud. We gather in the shadow of a world unsure of itself, of plans for peace lost in the plague of ambition, of a planet under threat. And yet, we have cause to be hopeful. Our...

We give thanks for this day and for these people and all the people who have enriched our lives. We give thanks for the gift of life with all of its pain and its joy, its struggles and its triumphs....

We join together now in a time of meditation or prayer, spoken at first and then for a time in the peace that silence brings.

Spirit who is all things to us; Presence in which we live and move and breathe and have our being: What a gift to be here together, sharing our food, our spirit, ourselves! We ask no blessing upon this food, nor upon ourselves, because the blessing is always here, if we but pay attention....

Spirit of life and spirit of grace, Rest with us this day, in this place. We lift up every joy, every gladness, We hold up every hurt, every sadness Spoken in this good company As well as every secret feeling Held quiet in the hollows of our hearts.

Spirit of life and love, thank you for the gifts of life and love. Help us to embrace fully the sweet and the bitter moments of our days. Help us to treasure the times of abundance and to find meaning in the times of emptiness....

Source of life and death, ground of all being, Spirit of our spirits, whose we are in life and in death—Life itself is the great mystery and death a part of it. In truth we know not the one nor the other. We live and die in the mystery of being from moment to moment till at the end we merge with...

Oh Divine Spirit, healer of my hurts, consoler of my sorrows, vibrant light of happiness, birther of all life and gentle way of death, hear my prayer. I raise my heart to you as do the ancient redwoods, rooted in the ground, swaying in the wind....

May the Waters gathered here remind us of what each of us brings to this community and of the waters that nourished us before we were even born, that continue to give us sustenance and energy for our life journeys. and for all creatures on this earth....

May we look with gratitude upon this day, for the beauty of the world, for the first radiance of dawn and the last smoldering glow of sunset....

Let us rejoice for the families who have gathered this Thanksgiving to express their thanks and to celebrate the bounty of their lives. Let us join together in support of those whose families are far away, with distances in many forms. Let us hold one another in gentle reverence this holiday of...