Will family Thanksgiving meals be replaced by hot deals, shopping thrills and retail “steals” in America’s stores? Will the day set aside for gratitude be turned into to a day of getting more stuff?

Perhaps stuffing Thanksgiving Day with shopping is not such a great idea. Let’s stuff the turkey; not the day. Why not take Thanksgiving Day to leisurely spend time with your family and friends and to thank the living God for all of His blessings in your life?

“Macy’s Department Store is famous for presenting the Thanksgiving Day Parade. But now the same store that is in its 87th year of producing a nationally-televised parade, watched by millions, is being blamed for ruining the holiday.

What has the store done? Decided to open its doors to shoppers on Thanksgiving Day at 8:00 p.m. Time magazine reports that people are denouncing the move as ‘greedy, misguided and unfair to the employees being forced to work on a day traditionally reserved for family.'” –Henry G. Brinton in Huffington Post

In a comment on the article Grassroots Efforts To Stop Thanksgiving Day Shopping Gain Traction at Forbes.com, Debbie Alton wrote:

“So this is what it has come down to. We wonder why there seems to be no morals any longer, no concern for another person, and a dwindling devotion to family, as we watch society in the great US plummet deeper into the “me, me, me, mine, mine, mine” manner of thinking. As a whole in this country we don’t have many days where our sole purpose is to reflect and appreciate the life we have. Thanksgiving is that day and we are watching it slip from our grasp further and further each year. It is a day where the only goal is to remind us of all we have that is good in our lives. A day where the things that truly matter are given the rightful priority in our thoughts.”

Here is a popular pledge that is being circulated: