Gratitude is My Attitude

“We are grateful. You have given us this day and have given us this way to say “Thank You”. We thank you for giving us what we need to be grateful.
We know our thank you is as fragile as we are;
 it can be crushed by the care of the moment
 it can disappear in the heat of the day
 it can be blown away by the winds of suffering
 and so we ask You to take our small thank you into Your great act of Thanksgiving.”
(condensed from Radical Gratitude by Mary Jo Leddy, pg69-70)
For myself it is when I have lost a dear one that Christmas takes on a deeper The book Radical Gratitude has been a part of my library for many years and I am no longer surprised when it, yet one more time, draws my attention…when I need a royal nudge to pause and to remember there is always something to be grateful for in my everyday moments. I know firsthand how challenging it can be to say that simple “thank you” or to move beyond the words when the world around me is crashing down and I want to shout anything else but “thank you!!” However, with a little willingness to change my attitude, I have also learned (sometimes the hard way!!!) that it is okay to feel less than thankful as long as I don’t stay there. Just like the rest of our emotions, a sense of gratitude can come and go as quick as the flame is lit!
Radical gratitude invites us to move beyond taking life for granted and to move beyond our sense of powerlessness in changing ourselves and the world we live in. Our Master Way-Shower, Jesus, exemplifies the richness of an intentional attitude of radical gratitude. Jesus knew He was born a child of God and with that came a life dedicated to putting weight to his words in radical actions; that which we give away multiples, ignites and sustains!. So it is, that when we daily affirm an attitude of gratitude for even the smallest gift of life in a day, we are nurturing, growing and sustaining our faith and hope. We become the possibility of creating something new in the world. We become the possibility of becoming someone renewed.
As we move into the busyness of the Advent and Christmas season before us, may we make time to pause and affirm the reason we celebrate Christmas; may we be radically grateful for the birth of Christ – the ground of our hope, our joy, our peace, and our love of all life in, through and amongst us.
Ellen