The theme of the meeting was gratitude and the role that gratitude plays in our lives. Elizabeth Espersen set the stage, as she talked about the power of gratefulness. Women who are grateful, she said, have the power to heal the broken world in which we live. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To illustrate, she held up a transparent globe that was in two segments. She asked each woman to write a word that expressed gratitude. Then she passed the \u201cbroken world\u201d around the room, and women placed their slips of paper in one segment of the globe. She said that we would return to the broken globe at the end of the meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Judaism\u2014Lynda Fuchs<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n When Lynda was asked to\ntalk about gratitude, the first thing that came to her mind was the prayer of Shehecheyanu\n(translation: “Who has\ngiven us life”), which\nis recited on any occasion of thankfulness, including, in her own home, on\nThanksgiving. Lynda stressed that she could speak only to the Judaism that she\npractices, but she said that no matter where you travel, when you find a Jewish\nhouse of worship, you will recognize the poetry, prayers and blessings because\nthey are the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gratitude permeates\nJudaism. Lynda celebrates Shabbat on Friday evenings. The lighting of candles\ndelineates the Sabbath, bringing one into a sacred space in time, separate from\nsecular time. She finds this time of pulling away from the world to be vital in\nher life. The Kiddush, a blessing over the wine, is chanted to thank God for \u201cthe\nfruit of the vine.\u201d A blessing is also said over the challah, a braided loaf of\nbread; a large chunk of the bread is broken off and passed around the table to\nthat everyone can partake of it. Lynda encourages those who celebrate Shabbat with\nher in her home to bring a reading or poem to share. She brought copies of Marge\nPiercy\u2019s The Art of Blessing the Day: Poems With a Jewish\nTheme,<\/em> a favorite of hers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sukkot, the Jewish\nfestival of thanksgiving for the harvest, occurs at somewhat different times in\ndifferent years because it is based on the lunar calendar. In North America it\nalways occurs in autumn and coincides with the harvest, as it did in ancient\ntimes. Sukkot is a reminder that God redeemed the Jewish people from Egypt\nduring the reign of the pharoahs. Like a loving, caring parent, He caused them\nto live temporarily in booths (sukkot [plural]) that sheltered them from the\nelements. The festival of Sukkot also reminds us that in ancient times, a\nfarmer would stay in a booth (sukkah [singular]) at the edge of his field so as\nto not lose valuable time traveling back and forth to his house during the busy\nharvest season. Jews traditionally commemorate these events by building these\ntemporary structures and living in them for seven days. Many Jews in Syracuse, where\nthe climate is not conducive to living outdoors in the fall, eat their meals in\ntheir sukkah. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynda pointed out that\nthe original American Thanksgiving took place in 1621. Later, George Washington,\nwhen he was president, proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving. Thanksgiving\nwas not celebrated again until after the Civil War, when it was seen as a way\nto unite people so that the healing of the nation\u2019s wounds could begin. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In summary, Lynda said\nthat Jews are grateful for each day. Jews do not describe things in terms of\nsin. They believe there is a spark of the divine in each of us, and that it is\nthe obligation of Jews to live up to that spark, to make each day worthwhile\nand do the best that they can. This goes along with the concept of healing the\nworld that Elizabeth spoke of. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Islam\u2014Naima Barbour<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Naima, a survivor of Hodgkin\u2019s lymphoma, said\nthat gratitude is part of a Muslim\u2019s day from the first prayer in the morning\nuntil the prayer at bedtime. She had always thought she was a grateful person,\nbut for the past three or four years she has taken a \u201ccrash course\u201d on\ngratitude\u2014 and she is still learning. At age 33, she had just moved back to\nSyracuse. She hit the ground running, getting a job, reconnecting with Danya\nWellmon and other friends. Then she noticed that she was getting tired, losing\nweight, and waking up with a fever. A biopsy revealed lymphoma. \u201cI screamed for\na minute,\u201d said Naima, \u201cbut that was just for the moment.\u201d Then she proceeded\nto figure out what to do about her disease. Her first concern was that she had\nno health insurance at the time, and she found that physicians were not\ninterested in treating the uninsured. However, Danya was working for Dr. Dhafir\nand recommended Naima to a good physician in East Syracuse. Fortunately Naima\nwas able to get insurance. She was treated for eight months with chemotherapy\nand radiation and went into remission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The first thing that\nNaima was grateful for was that the lymphoma had not spread throughout her\nbody. She was also grateful for the many good people she met during her course\nof therapy. After the treatments, much to her surprise, Naima found out that\nshe was pregnant. She felt happy and grateful about the pregnancy, since she\nhad been trying to have another child for seven years. During those years, she\nhad been working, attending school, and taking care of her older children and\nher in-laws, who were living with her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfortunately, her cancer\nreturned during her pregnancy. She was grateful that she was able to feel the\nnew tumor pushing against her collarbone because this gave her the opportunity\nto deal with it right away. She went from being very happy to being very\nscared. Her treatment this time was a stem cell transplant. Because the cancer\nhad not spread into her bone marrow, the transplant procedure could be done\nusing her own cells. Everything went well, although she required hospitalization\nand chemotherapy just to get ready for the procedure. Following the transplant,\nhowever, Naima suffered acute anxiety, partially brought on by postpartum\ndepression. Unlike after the initial diagnosis, when she was a little upset and\nnervous but felt she could lick her cancer, this time Naima was crippled by\nfear and could not leave her home. She knew she should be grateful: her baby\nwas healthy, and she had two other wonderful children. She was grateful to Danya\nfor pointing this out to her and for intervening when the doctors said that\nNaima was too sick to be treated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There is a constant theme\nof gratitude in the Qur\u0384an. Naima expressed gratitude for all the people who were\npraying for her. Her mother kept reminding her of people\u2019s concern for her and reassuring\nher that she was strong. She is grateful today for her good health. If you\nrecognize the divine first, Naima says, that relieves stress. Knowing that you\nmight not have tomorrow gives you no option but to be happy today. Naima reminds\nherself of Job. She also found that once she was less stressed, her friends\nbecame less stressed. We were not put on this earth to be miserable, she\ndeclared. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sharing<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n After Naima\u2019s and Lynda\u2019s\nstories, there was much lively discussion and sharing among the other members\nof WTB. Elizabeth told us that a female journalist, Sarah Josepha Hale, kept\nafter President Abraham Lincoln until he declared that the last Thursday in\nNovember should be Thanksgiving in every state of the union. President Franklin\nRoosevelt changed the date to the fourth Thursday in November.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Several WTB members who\nare cancer survivors spoke of gratitude for the lessons that cancer has taught\nthem. They characterized themselves as being healthier and happier than they\nwere before. One said she no longer fears dying; another, that she lives life\nfrom second to second. A third woman talked about the many other women who\nreached out to her, many of whom she did not even know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A new grandmother\nexpressed gratitude for her granddaughter and said, \u201cMy soul is dancing and\nsinging all the time.\u201d Another member expressed gratitude for the women who had\nfought for the political and legal rights that we all enjoy; she expressed fear\nthat many people do not remember this. A Muslim woman said that Muslims must\nname the things that they thank God for; with all their prayers, this amounts\nto 33 per day. Another woman was grateful for her new life in Syracuse and for the\nwelcome she received from so many people, particularly her WTB sisters who are\nlike an extended family. Two women remembered Jeanne Shenandoah telling WTB\nthat the Haudenosaunee are grateful for the weather, no matter what it is like;\nthis caused these women to rethink their weather complaints!<\/p>\n\n\n\n The meeting ended with our\nforming a huge circle. The broken globe was passed around, and each sister read\nanother sister\u2019s word of gratitude. Elizabeth reminded us that gratitude means\nreaching out. She put the two segments of the globe back together. As she held\nthe intact globe in her hands, a new sister suggested that we sing, \u201cShe\u2019s Got\nthe Whole World in Her Hands.\u201d So we did, as the \u201chealed\u201d world made its way\naround our circle. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Women who are grateful have the power to heal the broken world in which we live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7654,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[16,17,41],"class_list":["post-7650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-programs","tag-islam","tag-judaism","tag-spiritual-practices",""],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7650"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8722,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7650\/revisions\/8722"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}