Monday, November 8, 2010

Thanksgiving Poll

For our North American readers - how does your parish observe the day of national thanksgiving?

I floated canceling Thanksgiving Day service since we always have a Wednesday night Divine Service. I thought that surely the people would rather spend Thanksgiving morning getting the turkey fixed up. But no: turns out a lot of people really enjoy having service that day.

As I mentioned in a previous post we often use the propers for a Harvest Festival (as I'm planning this year) and have also used the Votive for Thursdays from Daily Divine Service Book which focuses on the Institution of the true Eucharist. The latter makes for a sermon that writes itself: the juxtaposition of Caesar's amorphous thanksgiving proclamation and the transient meal that results and the true Thanksgiving of the Eucharist with a feast of eternal consequence.

+HRC

17 comments:

  1. We have a Thanksgiving Eve Divine Service and nothing on Thanksgiving Day. It's the tradition I inherited and I have had no desire to change it, especially since it affords my family and me the opportunity to make the 2 1/2 hour trip south to spend Thanksgiving Day with family we rarely get to see. A little selfish? Maybe, but I still ain't changin' it! :)

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  2. My previous parish would hear nothing of moving Thanksgiving Day to the night before. My current parish had no problem moving Thanksgiving Day to the night before. Like Fr. Messer, this gives us the chance to go 4.5 hours south to see my rarely seen family and spend the day with them.

    At my last parish, I changed the service from Mass to Matins. Here I have not changed the practice of having Mass.

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  3. We always have a Wednesday Night Mass anyway, and so I use the Thanksgiving propers for "Thanksgiving Eve."

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  4. That's what we do too. And it's using the Thanksgiving propers with the returning leper.

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  5. When I arrived they had a Wed Eve service. I kept it. Allows for proper care of the Turkey on Thursday. No dry turkey!
    It is a mass. Not sure what it was before I arrived. I just figured that "thanksgiving" is best celebrated with the "Holy Thanksgiving."

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  6. We celebrate a harvest service on a Sunday in November. In the spirit of eliminating redundancies and not preaching two sermons about bringing in the sheaves, we should just do one corn stalk and cornucopia decorated service.

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  7. We celebrate on Thursday at 10:00 a.m. with full mass using the Thanksgiving propers. We have great attendance and since my family is 10-12 hours away, moving it to Wed. evening would do me no good. But I have to admit that I'm somewhat taken back by you guys who move a Mass to serve your personal desires! Not at all like the Gottesdienst crowd I'm used to seeing/hearing!

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  8. Fr. Kumm,

    Reports of our personal piety have been greatly exaggerated :)

    +HRC

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  9. Re.: revmlk's comment regarding the Holy Mass being moved for convenience- How did it get to Thursday in the first place? Since Thanksgiving is not an element of the church year, why would having it on Wednesday instead be a concern?

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  10. It is the POTUS who declares the National Day of Thanksgiving every year, I believe, and asks every one to celebrate it. And it is always on a Thursday. Render unto Caesar. I, like Fr. Mike, have a full Mass on Thursday morning at 10am with the Thanksgiving Propers, the color of the day being, I believe, white.

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  11. Fr. Anderson,

    I often start my T-day sermon with an excerpt from the Washington proclamation or the current president's proclamation - but just to show how amorphous, ungodly, and deistic it is.

    +HRC

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  12. Fr. Curtis,

    I once read several of the last proclamations and if my memory serves me correctly, you have to go back a long way to find one that mentions Christ. And since I am officially old, unlike most of you, I can't remember who wrote it. :)

    mlk

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  13. Mass Wed. evening, Thanksgiving propers. No service Thurs.

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  14. We sing a very joyous Matins that day - and max the service out with thanksgiving hymns. It's usually a packed church and we get to see family members that have moved away that we don't often see. Service lasts a maximum of 45 minutes, but the bells play, the choir sings, a short homily, a mighty Te Deum and by the time we're done, we're all ready to head home for a feast.

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  16. Mass Wednesday evening at 7 (thus "Thanksgiving Day" in the poll). Thanksgiving propers and, since he is the one who has invited us to worship particularly on that day, I also read the Proclamation by the President of the United States.

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  17. We receive a katalysis from the Advent Fast. No liturgical mention or changes due to Thanksgiving (St. George Orthodox, Wichita KS)

    Trent

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