I mean GEEZ! Some of my mormon family members make a long winded bless all the children in Africa and everything else out there. A simple blessing on the food is good enough. Even if I was God, I would good annoyed.

Yer kidding. All I ever heard (basically) was "blah, blah, blah and bless this food to strengthen and nourish our bodies and do us the good we need aninnanameofjebuschristamen".

Ron

That's the way blessings on the food should be. Short, sweet and right to the point.

I always thought it was funny that mo's say they don't use memorized prayers in their daily prayers. However when i would spend the night at a mo friends house their family and mealtime prayers were word for word the same. What mo doesn't know the above quoted blessing on the food? i never heard a variation that i can recall.

I always thought I was bad person for blessing the food EXACTLY THE SAME everytime. I mean, how many variations on "bless this food" were we supposed to come up with?

"Dear Heavenly Father, please bless this food that we are about to eat that it will nourish us and be free from any impurites inamojesuschristamen"

That's nothing.
Once I was with a guy in his car and he had come to pick me up so I would go babysit his children while he and dw would go out. He had a couple of errands to run before getting to their place. Each time we got back in the car after stoping (wether for groceries or gaz) he said a quick prayer before we left each place...

Wow talk about living in fear! Sad part is if he has an accident he would probably think it was because he didn't say the right thing.

Or if he didn't get hurt it was because he was wearing his holy underwear and because he said the prayer.

so it was not a very new convert.
It bugged me so much because a couple of times he asked me to do it. Silly me, I did not know how to say NO at the time.

My mom makes a quiet show of stopping before eating to bless her food when she visits... She says it to herself with her head bowed and hands clasped. I don't think she's trying to be rude about it, but we all sit there awkwardly while we wait for her to re-join the conversation.

Maybe its just me, but i would conspire with my family to all bow their heads and fold their arms after the meal....leaving mom to wonder what is going on :)

That would be way too funny! Of coarse then she would start doing it normally, figuring we were praying to bless the people cleaning up... But the first couple of times would be priceless!

Thats when i would conspire to have everyone get up and leave the table, leaving her sitting there alone. I know, confusion is of the devil.

OH i like that word. it has a nice ring to it. I think it may be useful in the future.

Like "get down off your rameumptom and join the rest of us" LOL

It's their way of manipulating a captive audience and it might have a passive/aggressive aspect to it. Afterall, who would dare complain about a prayer to God. Even if the prayer call calls out or insults a listener, it's difficult to complain and accuse the prayer giver of rudeness.

The right and usual prayer except for Christmas and Thanksgiving is "Please bless this food that it will nourish and strengthen us."

That one sentence does it except for the wordier families who say our bodies instead of us adding "and do us the good we need."

Priesthood guys who hope to be bishops or whatever have to add other reminders about living commandments and blessing the poor, the sick, and the crippled. My BIL talks so long that the rolls get cold every time. Finally, he is a bishop at age 70.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/21/2011 04:48PM by Cheryl.

One day I suddenly thoughted it funny that sometimes we prayed to god to bless the food we were about to eat so it would nourish us and the food on the table was not necesarely very "healthy" ;)

I always found it funny that people thank god for a meal he didn't even lay a finger on. Or when people would say "please bless the hands that prepared this food" as if they aren't there half of the time and cant be thanked directly.

I always thought that hands comment was dumb. They couldn't be bothered bless the whole person? Just their hands? silly

Is that synecdoche? (Did they learn it in the Schenectady Ward?)

I've always felt long, devotional-type prayers at the breakfast, lunch, picnic, or dinner table were a great opportunity for the supplicant to demonstrate their superior spirituality and general awesomeness. Self-aggrandizers, mostly, IMHO...

the blessing of the food in itself is an acknowledgement that god is also responsible for the lack of food on other people's homes.

also, would you thank your dad for buying you toys and food while he lets your siblings starve to death? and would you worship him?

of course christians don't see that.

But... if the person gets too long-winded, then I start making funny faces to the kids, (who by the way, gave up the closed-eye charade much earlier in the prayer).