Saying the shortest possible prayer By BOB RIPLEY

What's not to like about Thanksgiving? So serene. So mellow.

No Thanksgiving tree to trim. No benevolent Thanksgiving icon bearing gifts to ethical ankle biters. No nauseating Thanksgiving markdown sales offering no payments until the Second Coming.

All the day asks for is a word of prayer. Literally. Nothing grandiose or grandstanding. Mystic Meister Eckhert said that if the only prayer you ever pray is "Thanks," it's enough of a prayer.

When you drink from the stream, say the Japanese, remember the spring. So when you gobble turkey, from a can or an oven, say thanks to the turkey Maker.

It completes the cycle.

Some victims of mycobacterium leprae -- lepers, for short -- once yelled at Jesus for a little pity. The Great Physician prescribed that they go and show themselves to the priests. En route, one of them started to feel a tingly sensation where there had only been numbness for years. Another noticed scabs falling off and the discoloured skin turning pink.

That's when the group of 10 got separated. One of them, when he saw that he was healed, did a 180 on the path and headed back to where the healing had begun. He lay face down in the dirt at the feet of Jesus and got all emotional. He thanked Jesus and praised God as if they were one and the same.

Jesus was moved to ask, "Um, weren't there 10 of you? Where are the other nine?"

Where are they now? Everywhere. I am one. You? Has there been a healing along our path? I'm not talking about religious quackery that makes you want to change television channels, but the wholeness that comes in unexpected ways. We may not have been given our fingers back but we've been given our sanity back when it felt like we were going to come apart. Isn't that healing?

Has there been a healing along our path? I'm not talking about religious quackery that makes you want to change television channels, but the wholeness that comes in unexpected ways. We may not have been given our fingers back but we've been given our sanity back when it felt like we were going to come apart. Isn't that healing?

To the leper who came back, Jesus said, "Rise and go your way." He has become a model of thanksgiving if only for his passion and spontaneity. We learn more about him from this one crazy act than if someone had written an unauthorized biography. He didn't just mail a thank you card.

"Dear Jesus, just a note to thank you for the wonderful healing the other day. Life is so much easier with 10 fingers. Hope our paths cross again soon. Kindest regards."

No cultured courtesy. His thankfulness wasn't carefully choreographed. It was gratitude in its purest and most joyous form.

I can see him jogging down the road, stopping every 30 feet to click his heals together. Calling the boys over for a party. Maybe even cooking a turkey.

Insisting that for this of all meals, somebody ought to say grace.