Is there an FOTCM version of saying grace before meals?

[cinnamon]

The notion just came to me today - it felt necessary to say grace before cooking up some steaks, with all that's going on lately - and, all I had was the Catholic version I grew up with:

Bless us, O Lord,
and these, thy gifts,
which we are about to receive through thy bounty,
through Christ, our Lord, Amen.

Prayer of the Soul and the daily prayer felt like too much here - hence the question.

Thanks!

 

[Puma]

Catholics have a prayer to bless food:

Lord, we praise and bless you for (in your own words you say what you are thankful for).

Thank you Lord for life and sustenance,

You give them to us out of Your infinite mercy, not out of our merit.

Bless those who made it possible for us to receive this food here today.

Help those in need.

Move us to share with others how much we are and have and give us all hunger and thirst for You. Amen.

and a prayer for after finishing the meals

We thank you, Lord, for the food you have given us; make us use it always for our good.

Thank you for all your gifts. May the King of eternal glory make us partakers of the heavenly table.

Thank you, Lord, because, once again, we have been able to feed ourselves with the gifts that You generously give us. Lord, let there be no more hunger in the world.

I thank you, Lord, for this joy of the table: the food and the company of mine. Always bless this family and those who have neither home nor bread. Amen

 

[Alma.Innovadora]

Prayer of the Soul and the daily prayer felt like too much here

If the main reason for soul prayer is carefully made for the connection with existence itself and therefore to be unlimited, why change a part of it to a personal limitation? If you wish to thank life, god, cosmo, Caesar etc. just be honest without so much protocol, "Thanks!____. What you describe is like substituting one limitation for another.

Sometimes I say "thanks cass o casseo" when I remember some of the material at a particular time. I tend to use the prayer of soul for everything, when I am under stress, when I go to sleep, to give thanks, when something doesn't seem to go "right", before doing a job and I am nervous or anxious and can't see clearly. Instead of counting to 100, I repeat it several times. It is something natural and not steps or rules to follow.

 

[gottathink]

. I tend to use the prayer of soul for everything, when I am under stress, when I go to sleep, to give thanks, when something doesn't seem to go "right", before doing a job and I am nervous or anxious and can't see clearly. Instead of counting to 100, I repeat it several times. It is something natural and not steps or rules to follow.

I do the same,recite prayer of soul whenever I’m stressed about anything.
I like your question re a FOTCM prayer to give thanks at meal times.
Perhaps we could all collaborate to come up with one if someone hasn’t already.

 

[Raoulfrkannon]

If you're concerned about time, I would suggest these ideas from two quite different angles:

1. Take that a challenge, make an effort to overcome that concern, and say the Prayer of the Soul before every meal. You might be surprised how life-changing such an effort can be.

2. Just make up your own short one inspired by anything. do a search for what people of different cultures say before meals, and apply your knowledge to make the best one you can think of. Since I'm living in Japan, I say "Itadakimasu" like everyone else, which is the humble form of the verb for 'to receive'. The 'who' is under ellipsis, which is a common aspect of Japanese, but I try to keep in mind the One, and All, in an act of receiving and giving to others/itself.

 

[avivalevy3]

There are similar Hebrew prayers. When I can't remember all the words or I am just hungry, I thank the food itself. I just look at the food and say thank you for giving your life force to me to sustain mine. It seems to work. It acknowledges that before it was my food, it was a living being. Cleve Backster may be perceived by wiki as a fringe nutcase "paranormal studies with plants," but on the off change that they can feel, I thank them for their sacrifice.

 

[Mike]

I forget the prayer my family said at dinner... will try to remember or ask a family member. I was raised Catholic.

But as the one of three boys in my family, this was the spirit of the prayer that came to mind:

"Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, those that eat the fastest eat the most!"

Seriously though, maybe on Sunday I'll sit and write out what I would like to say for grace.

 

[Laura]

The notion just came to me today - it felt necessary to say grace before cooking up some steaks, with all that's going on lately - and, all I had was the Catholic version I grew up with:

Bless us, O Lord,
and these, thy gifts,
which we are about to receive through thy bounty,
through Christ, our Lord, Amen.

Prayer of the Soul and the daily prayer felt like too much here - hence the question.

Thanks!

That's the same one I grew up with. I think it is short, simple and universal and I doubt there is anything better.

 

[Benjamin]

There were several Lutheran prayers we used to say at meal times:

Not really designed as a prayer for breakfast, it's just when we said it:

The morning bright with rosy light hath wake me up from sleep.
Father, thy own, great love alone, thy little one doth keep.
All through the day I humbly pray, be though my guard and guide.
My sins forgive and let me live, bless'd Jesus by my side.
Amen.

The only other one I remember was a general meal prayer:

Come Lord Jesus, be our guest.
And let these gifts to us be blessed.
Amen.

There was a third prayer that, I think, we used to say at supper, but I can't remember it anymore.

 

[Benjamin]

The morning bright with rosy light hath wake me up from sleep.
Father, thy own, great love alone, thy little one doth keep.
All through the day I humbly pray, be though my guard and guide.
My sins forgive and let me live, bless'd Jesus by my side.
Amen.

It's weird. I had not recited this prayer in 35 or more years and basically forgot about it, and yet it just all came back. But I'm rusty and got some of it wrong.

It should be this:

The morning bright, with rosy light, hath wake me up from sleep.
Father, thy own, great love alone, thy little one doth keep.
All through the day I humbly pray, be thou my guard and guide.
My sins forgive and let me live, bless'd Jesus near my side.
Amen.

 

[fifty_five]

there are a lot of different means but in any case effective. My two cents: inform the water too

 

[scotseeker]

And then there is old Robert Burns prayer that was used in my home growing up (Scottish):

Some hae meat and cannae eat,
Some hae nane and wan it,
But we hae meat and we can eat,
So let the Lord be thank it.

It was used just before we sat down for supper, every time.

 

[Gonzo]

Thanks for starting this thread, cinnamon.

I've been saying grace every time I eat for several years. The wording has changed over the years from the more traditional Christian prayers from my upbringing to my current:
"Holy creation, I thank you for this meal. I am grateful to the animals and plants that have given their lives or energy that I may live. Bless this meal that I be sustained until my next."

A couple decades ago, I took up saying grace and an exercise in becoming more aware of things for which I should be grateful. I found I took a lot for granted and expressing gratitude opened new doors to understanding how interconnected we all are with creation.

More recently, i have been trying to incorporate saying grace as a means of sanctifying anything I put into my body, including tobacco and coffee.

This approach is interesting when encountering items that serve no real purpose or provide no tangible benefit to the body, but rather, cater to the more hedonistic tendencies (e.g. junk food). Chocolate and potato chips made a re-entry into my diet during COVID lockdown. It's a challenge to sactify such things and leads me to a more conscious awareness of what I consume and why.

I'm nowhere near where I want to be. The struggle is real :)

 

[Aiming]

My hubby and I started saying a prayer before eating our meals perhaps 3-4 months ago - saying thanks, blessing the food, reminding ourselves to stay aware in navigating the current times and praying for our connection to the STO realm to be strengthened.

It's definitely making a difference: another awareness of the meal in front of us, not taking it for granted and 'gulping it down', with thoughts elsewhere, but reminded of it being a gift, the sustenance we need while we're here in the body, as well as reminding ourselves of our greater context and inner orientation.

I can only recommend saying (or thinking) prayers before a meal. Meanwhile, for me, it feels 'wrong' not to say grace - and I don't mean saying it in an automatic, rehearsed way. It's about turning inward and feeling what you're saying, connecting yourself to DCM.

There must have been a deeper reason for the tradition of saying grace, apart from the experience of food shortages. Perhaps it's a reflection of an inner state of general gratitude and reverence for Creation that was once (or someplace-STO-else) a natural state of being, and saying it out aloud developed out of a remnant memory, because people had forgotten to live in this internal state?

 

[Pluchi]

"Holy creation, I thank you for this meal. I am grateful to the animals and plants that have given their lives or energy that I may live. Bless this meal that I be sustained until my next."

Hi Gonzo!
We say a prayer similar to yours:
"I am/we are thankful for this meal. I/we give thanks to the animals that gave their lives so I/we could feed myself/ourselves and continue living"

Once, I said my prayer in front of co-workers and one snorted "Ha! give their life? More like it was TAKEN so you can eat it. I don't think the cow gave its life for you to eat... (more laughter accompanied by another colleague)." They were vegetarians...