Greetings!      

Brethren,

I wanted to take this opportunity to wish you and your families a very safe and Happy Thanksgiving. For most of us Thanksgiving is a time for a healthy measure of that symbolic bird that we use to celebrate this wonderful holiday; while afterwards watching a little football. It is also a time for meeting family and friends, making trips to nearby holiday destinations for fellowship and of course watching those wonderful Thanksgiving parades. Thanksgiving is truly a harvest festival, and an American one. It is rang in each year with tremendous fervor and splendor throughout these United States.

Of course Thanksgiving isn't the only time we should give thanks; however, I think it fitting of course that we should rejoice on Thanksgiving Day and express our gratitude to that great Architect for both our families and our standard of living. With the world and our Country in the state it is in, perhaps it's time that we got back to basics and began to appreciate all that we have. Most of us have roofs over our heads, food on our table and that aforementioned family.

However, we as Masons also have Brotherhood, and in that, surely, there is great blessings and much to be thankful for when others are lonely. Therefore, I think it fitting we give thanks for friendship and what it means in our lives and how our Brotherhood has changed each of us for the better. So I encourage you to reach out to another Brother and let them know you are thankful for them. Each one of us has been given gifts and talents to be grateful for and I would also ask each of you to not only be thankful for them but to use them to the betterment of another Brothers life. Because as Aristotle said "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit". So we should endeavor to be excellent Brothers to one another.

I believe too we should give thanks for living in a such a wonderful country and those who protect it. Our Country was founded upon the very ideals we as Masons hold sacred. It is a place where we can express our thoughts and ideas freely; where we can walk down the street without fearing a hand on our shoulder seizing us off to imprisonment or torture.

And our health is, as they say, our wealth and anyone who has been ill knows this to be true. So I ask that you keep our sick and distressed in your thoughts and prayers this Thanksgiving, and may God be with them and their families.

Thanksgiving you see is more than just being grateful or a secular holiday where we celebrate our year's harvest and enjoy each other's company. It is a day for appreciating our own good fortune and sharing it with others. Whatever your race creed or beliefs on this Thanksgiving Day I encourage you to embrace the true reason for celebration.

Brethren, at this harvest I am thankful for you and your Brotherhood, and I encourage each of you to take this occasion as an opportunity to thank our Lord for the manifold blessings he has bestowed on us with His everlasting love in this past, and coming year. And I wish each of you the very best harvest in the approaching year.

May God bless and keep you,

Craig Robinette