How We Speak This Thanksgiving - Grief & Gratitude

In this conversation, Bishop DeDe reflects on the complexities of Thanksgiving, acknowledging the presence of grief alongside gratitude. She emphasizes the importance of allowing oneself to feel sadness during the holiday while also encouraging a shift towards positive communication and support among loved ones.

Takeaways

• Thanksgiving can be a time of mixed emotions.
• Grief is a natural part of the holiday experience.
• It's important to acknowledge feelings of sadness.
• Encouragement and support can transform the holiday atmosphere.
• Finding ways to express gratitude amidst grief is vital.
• Thanksgiving should be a true reflection of our feelings.
• Speaking words of encouragement can change interactions.
• Creating a supportive environment is essential during holidays.
• Acknowledging loss can lead to deeper connections.

AI Disclosure: To support our staff in their limited time, many of our episode summaries are first generated by AI and then edited by the Communications Director to accurately reflect and preview our podcast episodes.

Transcript

Bishop DeDe (00:01.921)
Hey friends, welcome to the podcast. This is a special edition. We're cutting into our usual programming with a podcast that's about something that is topical, timely, and important. Speaking of faith at the Thanksgiving table, whoa, that could be dangerous. And so we're gonna talk about that a little bit today because I think that often we go into these holidays thinking we should be happy, we should be happy, and we should be happy.

And then we get into the holiday and we realize, you know, our families have issues and they may not be as happy. And then there's a kind of a thing about Thanksgiving that I think we really need to focus on, which is the sadness of Thanksgiving, the grief that's around the table at Thanksgiving. My name is DeDe Duncan-Probe. I am the Episcopal Bishop of Central New York. I'm joined with Adam Eichelberger, who is our Director of Communications. And we are here to speak about our faith.

As with all of our podcasts, this episode is about how we talk about the things that matter most to us. And what a great sort of tableau, it were, the Thanksgiving table that we're gathering for Thanksgiving. And some of us are in different places with this. Some of us really look forward to gathering with our family, people we haven't seen in a while, reconnecting, having some of our favorite foods and

playing games or watching football or doing whatever the things are that are kind of our family habits. For some of us, Thanksgiving is a trial. It is something that we've been going to therapy a few times beforehand and afterwards we'll go to therapy a few more times to try to recover from. It's something that really takes it out of us and something that takes a lot of like fortitude because there's issues and there's concerns and there's things that happen in life.

And then for some of us, Thanksgiving is a little bit of a lonely time. We may have people we love that see no longer. We may be estranged from people or maybe alone. And so Thanksgiving takes on a whole nother meaning. If we're working through Thanksgiving and we're that person that takes up the slack at work because everybody else is going to spend time with their families and we're the person that's expendable and so is working through the day.

Bishop DeDe (02:27.115)
So there's all kinds of different diversity and ways in which we may engage in this one day of Thanksgiving. And then as if that wasn't enough freight, then we throw on top of it that this holiday is enfolded in some real tragedy. The appropriation of lands, the subjugation, oppression, and horrific stories with indigenous people in America. And then it's just a lot.

It's a lot, a lot. And we love, some of us love the story of, you know, with the pilgrims and with community around a table, and that's a good story, but cautious because there's just, it's a complex story. And so for today's podcast, and speaking of our faith in present day, we're gonna be talking about how might we gather around our Thanksgiving table this week in a new way.

And how will we speak of our faith around that table? Now, just so that you are aware, most families, Thanksgiving is one of those times where we try not to speak about our faith too much because we may have differences of opinion. We may have people around the table who believe, don't believe, don't want to hear about belief, others that really, really want to talk about things or talk about how those people need to change. so Thanksgiving may be a space

where we speak about our faith in a totally different way, which is not to speak about it specifically at all. Maybe speaking about our faith is to talk about the love that we have for one another. Maybe speaking of our faith is to talk about how much we appreciate the graciousness and generosity of those who are cooking or making space for us. And maybe we show our love.

by watching the football game and pretending to be interested in it or watching the football game and being cautious about rooting too much for the one team we're for, which is different than the team that the other person is for. And so all of these ways, this complexity that is relationship. You've heard me say it before. I think Christianity is all about relationship, relationship, relationship. And boy, is that true about Thanksgiving. I also often talk about

Bishop DeDe (04:49.527)
that ministry is really very much like Thanksgiving. Every Sunday when we go to church, there's usually the person who's talking about the thing they probably shouldn't be talking about and getting people riled up. And then there's the person who's in the kitchen being the martyr. Oh, no, no, no, I don't need any help, but who really wants everyone to pay attention to the fact that they're really suffering and the suffering saint. And then we're in the middle trying to act like we're not 10 and remember that we're actually grown up in.

and all of that. So sometimes these places of relationship can really be difficult to parse. So how do we do it? How do we live through this? Well, I want to invite you to think about what it is you want from this Thanksgiving, to be intentional about it. What is important for you? If only two things happen this week, what are you hoping they will be? And then to recognize that you might need some self-care to prepare for Thanksgiving.

rather than cooking for hours on end and doing all of that, maybe you want to invite people to cook with you. This will involve being willing to maybe lower our standards a little, maybe we have to share a recipe or two, but to change the narrative on that. And then if that usual pattern is we come in and we start doing things and then somebody gets really upset, if we know that that's the pattern of our family.

If there's kind of a way that it goes, we have power to interrupt, to change, to say, you know what, instead of we watch the football game and it gets more more intense until everybody's yelling at each other because they're rooting for different teams, to say, hey, what if we go out and go for a walk or what if we do play a game of cards or what if we change the narrative a bit? And then,

There are those moments where we may need to be really assertive in saying, you know what, I understand that you're mad at me and I understand that you're upset, but how about if we agree to talk about this later and right now we're going to focus on this. To go ahead and use those skills that we have to talk with clarity or to say, you know what, when you're saying these words, I find it difficult. So I'm gonna take a break. When I come back, how about we focus on the game or we talk about something different.

Bishop DeDe (07:12.701)
All of us can bring to the table at Thanksgiving a different energy, a more helpful energy, healing, forgiving, seeking reconciliation, setting boundaries, and knowing what not to bring up, because we know what not to bring up. We know that our conservative or super liberal family member, they're not going to change their mind on Thanksgiving Day. It's really not the day of Epiphany. It's the day of Thanksgiving. And so what matters most?

is our Thanksgiving for each other. And then, oh my heavens, the thing we always overlook, I think, at Thanksgiving is at the table, while it's a table of plenty maybe, or a table of food if we hopefully have enough, but it also is a table that is surrounded by grief. People we love but see no longer. Every Thanksgiving, I think about my grandmother and I think about people who no longer are living in this life.

And I think of them with hope and with love and with sorrow, things I wish they could see, things I wish they could know or I could say to them. And to take a moment on Thanksgiving to allow ourselves to just feel sad if that's way we feel, to feel a little bit of that this isn't always happy. know, this is sometimes Thanksgiving involves recognizing loss and being thankful for a life that has touched our own.

So whatever happens for you this Thanksgiving, whatever you're anticipating it to be, my prayer for all of us is that we'll be more intentional in making it a true Thanksgiving day, where instead of it letting it kind of be hurtful or painful, to find ways in which to have it be helpful and to speak words of encouragement to one another and change how we speak to each other.

Right now in this world, division, dehumanization, it is just all around us. So what if we were to form a new way of being this Thanksgiving? So that's my prayer for you. So Adam, I'm going to invite you in. I've said a whole bunch of stuff about Thanksgiving and things, but, cause I think we do go into Thanksgiving thing. It's got to be one way. This is how we do it here. We're always going to do this thing. And then we get tripped up and then it takes us time to recover from.

Bishop DeDe (09:35.339)
But I'm let you into the conversation. What are your thoughts about it?

Adam Eichelberger (09:39.779)
Well, I know, speaking from my own experience, Bishop, this time of year is always hectic. And I think that everybody can kind of agree with that. I know for me personally, Thanksgiving really took on a different life, both after I got married and started a family and also when my family moved to central New York from Arizona, my Thanksgiving traditions were very muted.

Bishop DeDe (09:55.254)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (10:06.144)
Like everybody came together and like there wasn't a lot of conversation and everything was very kind of polite and proper and everybody sat down and there was never any conversations about hot button issues or anything like that. So coming into and coming in from my family, which was a large family into my wife's family, which is located here where we are in central New York, who is also a large family who is very loud and very talkative.

Bishop DeDe (10:17.792)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (10:34.252)
It was a little bit of a culture shock at first, and it took some time for us to kind of iron out all the wrinkles. One of the things that I like that you said is how we set expectations around Thanksgiving. And this is less a question, but maybe something you can kind of chime in on on your own, whether it's from your experience in your family or maybe some of your thoughts. But some of the things that we started doing in our Thanksgiving gathering with my wife's family is

Bishop DeDe (10:45.793)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (11:03.444)
It is a little patriarchal in a sense that by and large, the women in the family do the cooking and the prep. And not for lack of trying, several of us in the family who are men have offered numerous times and been told numerous times to get out of the way. And so one of the things that we've had to do is resign ourselves to the fact that we can't help in this way. But like you talked about the football game and all that kind of stuff that we do, we have set

Bishop DeDe (11:11.755)
Mm-hmm.

Bishop DeDe (11:21.855)
Right.

Adam Eichelberger (11:32.441)
this expectation at our Thanksgiving gatherings that once the meal is done, we invite all the people who did all the prep and all the cooking and all that stuff to we give up the TV and they have started their own tradition of, okay, we don't want to watch football. And I know that some of this adheres to some pretty antiquated ideas around like gender roles and stuff. But what they have found, like a lot of the women in my family is they want to sit down and they watch Hallmark movies like the, like the.

Bishop DeDe (12:01.196)
huh.

Adam Eichelberger (12:02.2)
like the Hallmark Channel stuff. So they all get to sit down and they get the big TV for a while and like we're scrubbing pots and pans and running the dishwasher and setting all the leftovers aside. So that's one of the things that we do to try and kind of help maintain the peace around the table. But the other thing that we did in a couple of us kind of spearheaded this because we talked about this ad nauseum on this podcast about the climate that we live in and the differences it can create.

Bishop DeDe (12:17.345)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (12:30.414)
We have a strict rule every year as we're leading into Thanksgiving to hop into the family group chat or like maybe if your family is like ours, there's more than one. And we set the expectations before we go in saying like, hey, like let's not talk about things that are related to hot button issues or politics or even faith or things like that, which is again, it's hard for me as somebody who's been working in the church in some capacity for 22 years now.

Bishop DeDe (12:44.279)
Mm-hmm.

Bishop DeDe (12:59.881)
Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (13:00.078)
for me to not talk about faith in some way, but we also realize that some people have a lot of issues or hurts or trauma around faith. So like, we're not gonna talk about that kind of stuff and find ways to engage in topics together. So like one of the things we do is if you're like me and you're like our family, we're all blue bubble iPhone people, there's a poll feature that we put in the group chat to say like, what are things that we wanna talk about? And we put those in the poll and we vote. It's like American Idol.

So we vote on the things that we're gonna talk about and then we realize like these are the things that we're not gonna talk about. So I rattled all that stuff off for you Bishop, like what are some ways maybe in your own life or your experience with your family that you navigate the slippery slopes of holiday gatherings and maybe some things that we can take into ours.

Bishop DeDe (13:30.103)
I love it.

Bishop DeDe (13:36.279)
Mm-hmm.

Bishop DeDe (13:51.825)
well, you know, you've shared several things right there that I think are so helpful and really thought provoking. love the sharing of the tasks, you know, regardless who cooks, other people cleaning up that the same person isn't, you know, doing all of the things that people are participating. I mean, I grew up in a family that cooked together. My grandparents had a restaurant and so we were that family that it was a, which just in case you're thinking this is all like happy.

When you get a lot of chefs in the kitchen, there's a reason there's a saying about it. And so we would have a lot of chefs sometimes and have to negotiate that. But in my family, I have raised my kids cooking with me, which for those who are control freak type cooks, which I can very happily tell you that I probably am, it was hard for me because there's a way you do it, you know, and you're going to want it.

But then I finally checked myself and thought, you know, what's more important about Thanksgiving that the gravy is just so, or that we've laughed and talked and enjoyed making it, you know? And so when that perfectionism kind of gets a little too ramped up to caution myself and to say, okay, the most important thing is that we're cooking together. And now that my kids are pretty much grown, we have a great time. We put music on and we are in the kitchen cooking. We take turns. Who's making what?

And there are still times when it's like, you know, I need the stove or I don't, but then we negotiate that. And then when we sit down to the table, we can celebrate everyone's contribution to the table. and we have one family member who is not interested in cooking, so they decorate. And so they, the table is really nice. there have been years where the decoration for the table was actually butcher block paper that we kind of taped around and we had colored crayons and everybody could, you know, like draw on the

on the table when there were young children around. And that was a really great way for young children to be engaged in the table and to be there, but have something to do where it wasn't just like sit proper and don't make a noise. You could actually, you the kids could engage and draw some of the adults too. And I love your idea about ahead of time talking about, you know, some things you want to talk about. I've seen families who took like Trivial Pursuit games and took some of the questions from it.

Adam Eichelberger (16:05.391)
but

Bishop DeDe (16:16.574)
And then throughout dinner, like, you know, know, favorite such and such, where, know, top 10, you know, movies, you know, what's your best book you've ever read and to have conversation starters about things that are life-giving or fun for the family or engaging. And yes, you know, I love to watch football really. I don't like the CTEs. And so I have to have the little shout out that I quit watching some things because I don't want to contribute to.

I just am concerned about how we treat our players, but I grew up in Texas, so you know, football. but, to have things where everyone gets to take part. and so to have it really be a family gathering where, we're doing things as a family. I, we enjoy, you know, we also usually go to the Turkey Trot. So our Thanksgiving often starts with going.

right in the morning early and going and walking or running. And then we come back and there's something really great about having gone outside and done something even in the cold weather for those who are able. And it's kind of multi-generations, multi-abilities, everybody doing a thing. And then it kind of gets you, you you're kind of coming together with an appreciation for each person.

So listener, I don't know about you and what your holidays are like or what your patterns are like, but my encouragement to you is to think about it and to be intentional about it and to go into it thinking this Thanksgiving, I want it to be a positive experience. Or if it can't be a positive experience, I want it to be not so damaging. Or maybe this year I need to make a different decision if this is a place that there's too much challenge.

And maybe as a family, we can learn to lighten up a little bit, have some fun and actually enjoy each other. And if your family, I mean, Adam, your family sounds like y'all get along pretty well to just enjoy the camaraderie of being with people we love. So, this edition is a little bit different than the others. It's a little bit shorter. It's meant to be just sort of news you can use. So think about what you want Thanksgiving to be like.

Bishop DeDe (18:34.903)
to let us give thanks and let us not forget life is short and we don't have much time to gladden the hearts of those who travel with us. So I do think we need to be quick to love and make haste to be kind. And may you have a blessed Thanksgiving. And I look forward to speaking with you soon. Take good care.