Note to TUCSON Candidates: On November 15, meet at 1:30 on the stage. Bette Dickinson will lead the sharing on Hospitality, page 26 in the folder.

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Since I didn’t get this out in time for the Feast of All Saints, I’d like to reflect on a subject that is particularly related to the coming feast, Thanksgiving Day. Many of us will sit down at a table laden with more food than we can possibly consume in one meal, and how can we forget the far greater number who will have less food than they need. This is not to make us feel guilty about enjoying God’s blessings, but rather to make us more grateful. We are aware of this at the monastery, where we give out bus tickets to homeless women and men so they can get to some place where they will have a good meal. One hundred tickets used to last us a month. Now 300 tickets barely stretch to three weeks. Some of these go to people who ask awkwardly, because they have never been forced to live on the streets and beg before.

In Christine Pohl’s excellent book on hospitality, [1] she writes: “The periods in church history when hospitality has been most vi­brantly practiced have been times when the hosts were themselves mar­ginal to their larger society. The basis for their marginality varied. For ex­ample, the early Christians were a persecuted minority, literal aliens in some cases. In the patristic period, when persecutions were over, some Christians deliberately re-created marginality through their ascetic prac­tices and monastic life. Among the early Methodists, many of those who cared for poor people and strangers were themselves poor and of low so­cial status.”

Historically, Thanksgiving was first observed not by wealthy landowners in comfortable homes, but by new colonists scraping out a hard, meager living in an alien land. Today we may know people whose families have lived comfortably, perhaps for generations, and are now feeling the pinch of economic hardship. Their gratitude for the few gifts they still enjoy is probably greater than ours – those of us who enjoy abundant material blessings and take many of them for granted.

We all need a taste of what it means to live on the margins, and perhaps we can see the blessing to be found there. Whether we live on the margins because we are materially poor or are physically disadvantaged, whether we feel isolated by our religious or political beliefs, we are vulnerable and that can become a blessing when it makes us more sensitive to the perhaps different vulnerabilities of others.

TUCSON: Next meeting Sunday, November 15, 2:00 p.m. (1:30 for enrolled candidates - doors open at 1:15) N.B. The 3rd Sunday is very early this month!

There will be a brief presentation by Sr. Lenora on hospitality, and then we will watch a very short professionally made video, “Miracles in Mexico,” which follows up on Deacon Joe Bogushefsky’s slide show, that we saw last November at our meeting. This one is a movie, not slides. If you won’t be at the meeting and you would like to see it, log on to http://www.groodyriverfilms.com/ and watch it there.

DONATIONS for Deacon Joe Bogushefsky: Those coming to the November meeting are invited to bring clothing, bedding, tools, kitchen utensils, dishes or whatever you may wish to donate, that is not too bulky, for Joe to take to Mexico for the impoverished people living in the Nogales dump and in the various Nogales centers that he helps. If you have really LARGE items, please call Joe at 682-8600.

There will be papers out at the November meeting, for those who wish to be enrolled as candidates or make their Oblation after a year of candidacy. If you are not there, please call Sr. Lenora so that we are planning on you. There will also be opportunities to volunteer your services helping with the noon meal at the renewal day December 20th.