Grace before meals will bring families together this holiday season

Renew America ^ | November 22, 2005 | Kevin Fobbs

[KevinNuPac]

Grace before meals will bring families together this holiday season

Kevin Fobbs

Every holiday season families confront the age old problem: How do we restore our old traditions to the dinner table especially when it seems, more and more, that dysfunction rears its formidable head instead. Families will see Uncle Peter or Aunt Rita or even cousin Mike just forego the polite pleasantries and just dig right into the turkey, dressing, or candied yams, without even a blink of moral guilt.

Well this scene is probably all too familiar and it is why Hollywood in the Heartland Report with Cheryl Felicia Rhoads on The Kevin Fobbs Show decided to tackle this holiday phenomena straight on.

We thought that by focusing on some of the un-pleasantries like social faux pas that seem to multiply with each holiday season, the American holiday family goers needed a break. You've seen it too — the ignoring of prayer to bless the holiday meal or not showing respect or celebrating family and the American Thanksgiving culture as well as the holiday meal itself seem at times to be treated with scorn.

On Wednesday, November 23rd Hollywood in the Heartland Report with Cheryl Felicia Rhoads and The Kevin Fobbs Show brings the changing images of today's society together with positive images that help those who lack a frame of reference of a time when civility and grace were a respected mode of behavior. We felt we all might benefit in some small way in our own family holiday celebration if we focused on the television pilot, Grace Before Meals, with the help of its producer who is also a noted and celebrated movie producer Tim Watkins.

When Tim Watkins' name is mentioned, film critics and national leaders as well as serious film goers usually focus on his critical film masterpiece "In the Face of Evil: Reagan's War in Word and Deed." His film captures President Reagan's and our nation's values which are sometimes easily overlooked and certainly forgotten by those who celebrate moral defeat. His talent brings out the embedded values that remind us we have much to be thankful for in our nation — our culture and faith, freedom and family and all that many of us who care constantly attempt to recapture true moral leadership and moral courage.

Watkins took his talent at reaching our national heart to create and produce television productions like Grace Before Meals, a cooking show with a family-friendly message and Home of the Brave, a look at the heroic efforts of our military in the international War on Terror to bring out a menu of patriotic and family-value emotions richly served up for our viewing enjoyment.

With the holiday season now squarely upon us, it is important to examine how families can celebrate traditional values at their Thanksgiving meal. This is most certainly something we all wrestle with — especially with our fast-paced, gotta-have-it-now culture, that can easily let the family holiday dinner fall to the wayside.

That is why Hollywood In The Heartland Report targeted the program, Grace Before Meals as a means to bring the family back to the table with the help of its host, the dynamic and talented Father Leo Patalinghug.

Far too many families in America have lost its family moral settings when it comes to mealtime in our nation's homes. What better way to recapture it...to learn how to share it and even to create new family traditions as well as strengthening family relationships. around the holiday dinner table.

Grace Before Meals uniquely sets forth the premise that food feeds the spirit and that mealtimes can be daily small blessings. Grace Before Meals helps families and individuals come to terms with life's challenges through the meditative process of preparing a meal. Holiday meals certainly need that!

Join Father Leo, acclaimed film producer Tim Watkins and actress and conservative commentator Hollywood In The Heartland Report host Cheryl Felicia Rhoads at 2:00 p.m. EST on The Kevin Fobbs Show. Listen live at www.wdtkam.com and call in toll-free with your comments or suggestions at 1-800-923-9385. And as Fr. Leo says as he signs off: "To Stronger Spirits. Better Food.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kevin Fobbs is President of National Urban Policy Action Council (NuPac), a non-partisan civic and citizen-action organization that focuses on taking the politics out of policy to secure urban America's future one neighborhood, one city, and one person at a time. View NuPac on the web at www.nupac.info. Kevin Fobbs is a regular contributing columnist for the Detroit News. He is also the daily host of The Kevin Fobbs Show on News Talk WDTK - 1400 AM in Detroit. Listen to The Kevin Fobbs Show online at www.wdtkam.com daily 2-3 p.m., and call in toll-free nationwide to make your opinion count at 800-923-WDTK(9385)

© Copyright 2005 by Kevin Fobbs http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/fobbs/051122

[KarinG1]

If Cousin Mohammed shows up it might be best to forgo the pleasantries and just dig in. Especially if you are a Jew.

[ccmay]

Families will see Uncle Peter or Aunt Rita or even cousin Mike just forego the polite pleasantries and just dig right into the turkey, dressing, or candied yams, without even a blink of moral guilt.

Not in our family. Not at Thanksgiving. Not ever.

-ccm

[Free Baptist]

The article doesn't define "Grace." Gracia, Gracias are words from other languages that might help. "Grace" is saying, "THANK YOU!" Saying "Thank you" to whom? Well, if you treat Him as an artificial person, or merely as a religious concept, and your "pleasantries" are merely tradition, then He is more offended than pleased. You are, in that frame of mind and heart, perhaps, better off to forget the whole thing. Your "Thanksgiving" holiday is not for giving thanks anyway - - it's for televised football games, a day (or more) off work, etc. etc. Romans 1:18-32, given by inspiration by the One to Whom we should give thanks, teaches that the moral and spiritual degeneration of individuals and entire societies begins with being UN-thankful. Do you wonder why your own children act like such utter ingrates at time? In-GRATES! As in NO GRACE! Look at the roots in the words. It is not whether you propagate a "tradition" that matters. It is whether you recognize the source of all goodness and bounty and whether you are truly grateful to Him. I don't see this much in the general vulgar, godless conservatism as currently expressed on Free Republic.

[VOA]

bump

[Mr Ramsbotham]

“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”

[trebb]

Same here - we gather everyone together and I say Grace before all meals. Those that don't care for it are welcome to stand there and fume, but most folks either like it or are too polite to say otherwise.

God Bless

[b9]

You are proof that even curmudgeons need love.
Enjoy your Thanksgiving.

[leadpenny]

The "God Squad" will be on with Imus in just a couple of minutes. They are always uplifting.

[Rubber_Duckie_27]

Unfortunately for this Thanksgiving we'll be with my non-religious (even anti-religious) in-laws. Grace will not be a part of the meal and it will be sort of strange.

I shouldn't be surprised. I once had to give my husband a crash course in how to say the Lord's Prayer, since he was raised in a totally secular home. I am fortunate that he has since embraced belief, even if he is not always consistent in religious practice.

[b9]

B2FUL. Thank you.

[Mrs. Darla Ruth Schwerin]

"Well, if you treat Him as an artificial person, or merely as a religious concept, and your "pleasantries" are merely tradition, then He is more offended than pleased. You are, in that frame of mind and heart, perhaps, better off to forget the whole thing."

Yes, I agree. I also got the impression that some distant entity was being addressed...
God Bless those who want HIS blessings!

[ccmay]

I use a real short one we call the "restaurant grace".

"Bless this food to our use, and us to Thy service, in Christ's Name, Amen."

We can go anywhere, and my kids don't mind bowing their heads for three seconds while I say this unobtrusively. They and their friends all go to parochial school, so they don't think it's "weird" or anything.

-ccm

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

BREAKING: ACLU SEEKS TO OUTLAW SAYING OF GRACE BEFORE MEALS

[ccmay]

when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father

I think a quiet Grace around the family dinner table falls into this category, and is not comparable to standing on street corners with the Pharisees and holy rollers.

-ccm