Day 982: Wednesday, November 23, 2022

When you make others feel good, it makes you feel good and then everyone feels good!

Being thankful is really good for you

By the CBC Kids team

There are lots of reasons why it’s important to be thankful and show gratitude for the people and things we have. But did you know that being thankful is also good for your health? Here’s a list of why it’s great to be grateful not only at Thanksgiving but all year long!

You make other people feel good when you show them you appreciate the things they do for you. This can turn good friends into best friends. A simple “thank you” goes a long way! Saying it helps you to have better friendships, and you will get along even better with your family.

When you make others feel good, it makes you feel good and then everyone feels good!

Being thankful gives you confidence

Being grateful for the things in your life gives you more self-esteem. Like something as simple as a beautiful sunset.

This means that you will be more confident and less worried about comparing yourself to others. Being grateful is contagious and others will want to be grateful just like you!

Thankfulness makes you a more positive person

People who are thankful are more positive instead of negative. When they see a glass with water in it, they say the glass is half full. Negative people will see that same glass of water and say it's half empty.

We want to be thankful for the water that is there, not worry about the water that isn’t.

Writing a gratitude journal can help you sleep better

If you journal at the end of every day you should write a list of all the things you're thankful for that day. You will sleep much better.

This helps you to remember all of the good things from your day. Like the delicious pizza you had for dinner or that friend who helped you with your school work.

You’ll fall fast asleep with a big smile!

It just makes you happy

Being thankful makes you aware of other people’s feelings — this is called empathy (being able to see things from another person’s view).

Gratitude also helps you through tough times because you can easily call to mind all the good things in life. And this makes you happy and being happy keeps your mind and body healthy!

Be thankful and share your gratitude with hugs!

ANNOUNCEMENT

from John Dear and the Beatitude Center

Dear friends, May the peace of the nonviolent Jesus be with you!

“The Beatitudes Center is becoming the number one place to hear about the nonviolence of Jesus.” That’s what Terry Rynne, chair of the Beatitudes Center board, said at our last meeting.

“People are practicing Gospel nonviolence,” Cathy Crosby added, “and we can find out about it at the Beatitudes Center. That’s why for me the Beatitudes Center is a place of hope.”

“War and violence are not a solution,” Fr. Ray East continued. “The Gospel calls us to nonviolence and the best place to learn more about it is at the Beatitudes Center.”

The Beatitudes Center for the Nonviolent Jesus is just two years old, but in that short time, it has taken off and become an online hub where you can hear from the wisest peacemakers and best teachers of Gospel nonviolence.

Over the past year, we’ve hosted so many prestigious guests, starting with Rev. James Lawson, Dr. King’s friend and colleague. Others have included Martha Hennessy on her grandmother Dorothy Day, Robert Ellsberg on editing Dorothy Day’s writings, Archbishop John Wester on his recent pastoral letter calling for nuclear disarmament, Carolyn Whitney-Brown on Henri Nouwen, Jim Finley on the mystical foundations of nonviolence, and so many others--Shane Claiborne, Kathy Kelly, Ken Butigan, Roshi Joan Halifax, Kazu Haga, Rajmohan Gandhi, and Professor David O’Brien.

Next week, Dec. 3rd, one of the world’s leading scholars on nonviolent resistance, Maria Stephan, will join us—Don’t forget to register!

Next year, we will host another incredible line up, including Rev. Ron Rolheiser, Marisa Guerin, Frida Berrigan, Bishop John Stowe, and Dr. Cornel West, one of the greatest living prophets of justice and peace.

But to continue this work, I need your help, so I’m writing to ask for your support. Please join me in daily prayer for the Beatitude Center, that the God of peace will bless this mustard seed project that it will touch many more people. Please share the website, www.beatitudescenter.org with your friends, family, and fellow churchgoers, that others may learn about our exciting programs.

Please send a tax-deductible donation today of $25, $50, $100 or whatever you can give so that we can continue and grow this vital ministry. You can donate online at www.beatitudescenter.org/donate-to-the-beatitudes-center/ or you can send a check payable to “The Beatitudes Center” to PO Box 1915, Morro Bay, CA 93443.

We rely solely on donations and program registrations. There’s so much more I’d like to do, such as increase our outreach, but we need help to do it. Next fall, I hope to travel the country on a national book tour for my forthcoming commentary on the synoptic gospels from the perspective of nonviolence, and to tell people about our great programs. (I will write in the new year asking for your help to host me at your church or school!) Eventually, we dream of launching a youth formation program, that could help teach young adults about Gospel nonviolence.

Why give to the Beatitudes Center? “I give to the Beatitudes Center because the message of nonviolence is so needed in the world today and we need to help those who promote it, and help people everywhere to live more nonviolently and to spread the Gospel message of nonviolence,” board member Sharon Halsey-Hoover says. “The Beatitudes Center helps me live Gospel nonviolence, so I want to support it.”

“I give to the Beatitudes Center because when I listen to a podcast or watch a live zoom, I feel hope and joy and get inspired by those working for peace and God’s way of peace, and I want to be part of that,” Cathy Crosby added. “The Beatitudes Center keeps me hopeful.”

Next week, Terry and I travel to Rome to attend another conference on nonviolence. “Pope Francis is trying to turn the church toward Gospel nonviolence,” he says, “and the Beatitudes Center helps us keep up as it embraces nonviolence. We need some place to help explain Gospel nonviolence, and we need everyone’s support to do this.”

Thank you so much for your support! I look forward to hearing from you.

Happy Thanksgiving and may the God of peace bless us all! –Fr. John

PS. This week, “Nonviolence,” a 147 page edition of “Oneing,” Richard Rohr’s theology journal which I edited, will be published by the CAC. It includes my conversations with Jim Lawson and John Lewis, and a wide range of essays by Joan Baez, Shane Claiborne, Jim Finley, and many others. You can order it at www.cac.org/news/now-available-oneing-nonviolence .

Also, as we begin Advent, don’t miss the online premiere of my conversation with my friend, actor, and activist Martin Sheen, Dec. 3rd, 7 pm EST. The free video will be posted then at the Henri Nouwen Society YouTube channel.