Prayers of gratitude

Prayers of thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving is one of the four traditional categories of Christian prayer, alongside praise, petition, and confession. The Christian tradition is unusual among major religions in giving thanksgiving such central liturgical weight: the central act of worship across all Christian traditions, the Eucharist, takes its name from the Greek word for thanksgiving. The prayers gathered here are the tradition's main prayers of gratitude: the great General Thanksgiving from the Book of Common Prayer, the Magnificat from the Gospel of Luke, the Te Deum, Luther's mealtime prayers, and the prayers said after recovery from illness. They are unanimous on a single point: thanksgiving is owed before it is felt.