Friends,

As I get ready for this Thanksgiving, I am working on my own attitude of gratitude. Without wanting to gloat, I give thanks for so much that I continue to take for granted – fresh food, health care, a warm bed at night.

Even more than those things, I give thanks for people – particularly for you, Western Church:

• The ways you as a community are showing up on Zoom and for the ways you continue to support Miriam’s Kitchen, this time of year and always;

• All who are making your annual pledge to Western Church, committing to the ways we continue to live into God’s love and justice;

Western Friends,

Each year on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, we at Western celebrate our longstanding partnership with Miriam’s Kitchen. As we get ready for worship this Sunday, I share with you what I shared with folks on Miriam’s staff last week.

I have always been proud – almost sinfully so - to pastor a church whose building houses Miriam’s Kitchen. This year my pride and gratitude have grown to a new level.

Here at Western Church, we believe the work of Miriam’s Kitchen is the most faithful use of our space we can imagine. MK does holy work at 24th and G Streets throughout the week: feeding hungry people, helping neighbors find housing and services, and creating a welcoming community where lives are changed.

As we celebrated Veterans’ Day this week, giving thanks for the faithful service of so many in our military, a friend reminded me that the day originated as Armistice Day, the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918 when the truce was signed to end World War I.

Armistice literally means “arms stand still” (from the Latin arma sistere). Congress declared the date “should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations.”

They had thought the armistice ended “the war to end all wars.” 102 years later we know otherwise.