BOMBAS

Tags

dignity, gratitude, prayers of gratitude, remember, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Veterans Day

I was just looking at a new website – new to me, I mean. It’s called Bombas. Maybe you’ve heard of them. They make socks and for each pair they sell, they give one pair to a homeless person. They say that the one item of clothing most needed by poor or homeless people is socks. At the moment their website says that they have given away 40,000 pairs of socks! (You see why I say it’s not new. I think they have been in existence for about five years, but still, that’s a lot of socks!)

Today I saw a new face of Bombas. It concerned their care for military veterans. I’m amazed at their organization and happy that I found it on the internet in a new way on this Veterans’ Day holiday. The Executive Director of Bombas, Marguerite Bachand, announced today Operation Dignity, a program serving at-risk veterans in their 20s, their 70s and every age between, providing them and their families with emergency, transitional and permanent housing as well as comprehensive outreach and support services, under the title, Operation Dignity. (You can find it on the internet.) Today is a great day to remember the service of our military men and women. If you are so inclined and able, why not give socks for Christmas this year? (…even order them today from Bombas!).

Perhaps the greatest gratitude you can give is through your prayer. Please join me throughout today – and beyond – in offering a bow of gratitude in the prayers we say for all those we know and those unknown to us who have given service to our country and the world. God’s blessing on our Veterans!

All of Creation Sings

Tags

beauty in creation, bless the Lord, Book of Daniel, creation, Creator, prayers of gratitude, Thanksgiving, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today as we in the United States approach Thanksgiving Day, we are reminded by a section from the Book of Daniel to take note of the natural world in our prayers of gratitude. Even when all the flowers (at least here in the Northeast) are gone and the trees have shed all their leaves, even when frost replaces the loveliness of green grass (and the task of mowing!), even when the bears and some of the littler creatures have gone into hibernation, there is yet a beauty in creation. I find it most visible in the shapes of various trees, their branches not hidden now by leafy dressing, in the clarity of stars on cold nights of deepest darkness and in the patterns and sparkle of frost on sunny mornings. So now I call on the creation, as Daniel did, to “give glory and eternal praise” to the Creator of all:

Sun and moon, bless the Lord; stars of heaven, bless the Lord; every shower and dew, bless the Lord; all you winds, bless the Lord; fire and heat, bless the Lord; cold and chill, bless the Lord; praise and exalt Him above all forever! (DAN 3:62-67)