This year is the 145th anniversary of Denver's annual Interfaith Thanksgiving Service. For those who don’t know, Denver’s Interfaith Thanksgiving Service is one of the oldest continuous interfaith partnerships in the country. The first “Community Thanksgiving Service" was held in 1876 as a partnership between several congregations and this same group has continued to gather together each year for the past 145 years, with other representative congregations joining in along the way.

Here is an excerpt from our church history book that recalls the service’s origins: "Brother J.H McCullough, pastor of Central Christian Church, organized the first Community Thanksgiving Service in Denver and hosted it at the Unity Church at 17th and California Streets, where Central Christian was leasing space at the time. An unnamed Presbyterian minister officiated, other Christians and Unitarians, and notably members of Temple Emanuel, the first synagogue established in Colorado, were in attendance. This was the first Interfaith Thanksgiving Service organized west of the Mississippi River and remains the longest established Interfaith Thanksgiving Service west of the Mississippi. In 1916, the service welcomed participants from the Denver Buddhist Church (which became the Tri-State Buddhist Temple) and over the years has welcomed new partners of different faiths so that today we have participants from Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Unitarian expressions of faith."

With 500+ participants expected on a typical Thanksgiving Day, the service is hosted in rotation between our interfaith coalition’s largest sanctuaries and this year it is again our turn to host. The service will be held in-person in our sanctuary with limited seating and appropriate social-distancing measures observed, and will be simulcast for online participants on our Facebook page.

Please share this invitation and the virtual link with your friends and neighbors and put it on your calendar to attend what has become a wonderful tradition for our community as we celebrate and give thanks to God together each Thanksgiving Day.

Planning to come? RSVP to this event on Facebook or email the church office at ccchurch@centralchristiandenver.org.