Press Releases

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Toronto: Thanksgiving is the time of year when we give thanks for abundance—but it is also a time to remember that “if we believe in the abundance of what appears to be scarce, we create conditions that help generate abundance.”

That is the message delivered in a Thanksgiving reflection posted on this website by the church’s newly elected Moderator, Mardi Tindal.

Tindal introduces the idea of recognizing how abundance can be found in community by telling the story of her own congregation’s experience providing a Sunday night supper for anyone who needed it all winter long.

“As many Canadians gather this weekend with family and friends to celebrate Thanksgiving, I hope the concept of recognizing ‘apparent scarcity’ and ‘unexpected abundance’ offers a powerful message of hope in a society that often tends to see what is not there, rather than what is there, and what might be,” says Tindal.

Tindal says her message is an invitation to imagine what it would mean to trust in the supply of whatever seems scarce in our lives today. It is an invitation to courage.

“When we act as if we believe in the abundance of what appears to be scarce, we create conditions that help generate abundance. When we do this in community, the power that arises from our common action is almost unbelievable,” writes Tindal.

The Moderator’s Thanksgiving reflection can be found on this website. Newspaper editors are welcome to publish the reflection in its entirety as a Thanksgiving feature commentary.

For more information, please contact:

• Mary-Frances Denis
  Program Coordinator, Media and Public Relations
  The United Church of Canada
  Tel: 416-231-7680 ext. 2016
  Toll-free: 1-800-268-3781 ext. 2016
  E-mail: Mary-Frances Denis