Some years ago, we attended a Thanksgiving service at Infant Jesus of Prague Catholic Church in Flossmoor where, during some opening comments, a clergyman intoned words from the book of Micah.
“We are required to act justly and show mercy,” he said and then inserted a new phrase:”…and to feed the hungry.”
I wrote then that earlier during the day we spent an hour or so in last-minute shopping for items we thought we would need to round out our dinner table on Thursday. This broke our budget and, when the ushers came around with baskets for donations to feed the hungry, I gave my last dollar.
Poorer by one dollar, I quickly grasped, is not to be poor and hungry as, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is the condition some 34 million people in this country live with on a daily basis.
Thanksgiving is our unmatched national holiday. It is the one where we celebrate the goodness that we share with the other. We toast good health, good food, good company and good times and, at our house as in so many others, we share thoughts of thanksgiving and for what we should be thankful.
Apple and pumpkin pie will be sweetened with words of what we are thankful for and for what we have and for the six people at our table this Thursday.
No, make that seven. We set a plate for an unknown guest. I then add money we spent for food and refreshments, for cooking and cleaning, so we can determine an approximate cost to feed each person at the table. We calculate the price of extra slices of turkey. We estimate the cost of second helpings of potatoes and gravy. We evaluate the slice of pie we wrap in foil for guests.
There is no charge for the warmth and companionship but we throw in a few dollars for extras. We then divide the total by seven and arrive at the price we set to feed the unknown guest. We stick a check in an envelope and send it to a food pantry, a family shelter or a support group of any institution that helps those in need.
We also do it in other ways.
When a grocery store that was “opening soon” in Park Forest (never happened) gave away free turkeys, I took one home for the holidays. A day or so later our son (a vegetarian) dropped off a second bird at our house as a Thanksgiving present. We were able to donate one of the turkeys to the St. Irenaeus Catholic Church food pantry on the condition that it go to a family who could not afford Thanksgiving dinner, which, I was assured, would be the case.
We make choices.
The day after Thanksgiving is Black Friday. It is the annual mercantile madhouse that opens the gates of holiday shopping. Your donation you give to feed someone on Thanksgiving will not go to the merchants. That big screen TV set marked down for sale can wait. Remember that the cellphone that connects you to people you may not want to call or the expensive laptop you always wanted may be replaced by an even better models six months from now.
There is always a sale and there are always hungry people to be fed. The choice is yours.
So whether you are religious or not, that words in the Leviticus should be noted:
“When you reap the harvest of your land, do no reap to the very edges of the field, or gathers the gleanings of your harvest. Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor.”
Happy a wonderful Thanksgiving.
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Jerry Shnay is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.