We thank you, our Father, for the beauty that lies about us: this Earth, lovely in springtime, with its bursting buds and the riot of color in flowering gardens; the cool relief of the first heavy shower after a parched summer; the golden fruitfulness of autumn; and the bracing cold of the winter months.
We thank you for the symphony of sight and sound in nature – deep blue skies and green, grassy lawns; moonlit nights and the first flush of dawn; the chirp of the cricket, the sweet note of the robin; the droning hum of the bees, the excited welcoming bark of a loved pet dog.
We thank you for home and friends and family and the deep content of the fireside in beloved human companionship – with the crisp, sharp cold outside.
You have given us an exquisite setting and immense capacities. We pray that we might be increasingly worthy of this – that inspired by the unsurpassable beauty of your creation, we might strive to cultivate within ourselves a quiet and calm spirit — poise and dignity — the beauty of disciplined, orderly lives, the serenity born of devotion, the deep peace that comes only from perfect love, and of abiding faith in you.
Amen.