Thanksgiving

“In everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” 1 Thessalonians 5:18

In a recent issue of Christianity Today, Cornelius Plantinga Jr. made a chilling observation by commenting, “It must be an odd feeling to be thankful to nobody in particular.”[1] We have all just witnessed plenty of that, I am sure, with last week’s national Thanksgiving holiday celebrated by Christians and atheists alike. Any tally of the mention of “God” verses the mention of “turkey” in our daily media would have shown a great imbalance in favor of the bird. Plantinga pointed out, however, that being thankful “in general” is very odd. “It’s a little like being married in general.”

Before dismissing for the holidays last week, my Spanish teaching wife brought out in her class that Thanksgiving is a truly unique American holiday. No other country has anything quite like it. With that said, she ventured out onto thin ice and asked her class who the first celebrants were thankful to. There was much awkward silence followed by timid expressions of pilgrims being thankful to the Indians for bringing food. Yes. That was it. The pilgrims were thankful to the Indians for bringing food. This was the sage consensus of high school sophomores and juniors from a rural area of Knox County in the heart of the Bible Belt. It was enough to make a grown teacher cry. She went on to remind them of the Jamestown and Roanoke colonies, two failed experiments with which they were at least familiar. Can anyone say, “survival?” The survivors of Plymouth Rock had a lot more on their minds than a mere harvest feast and Indian game. They were thankful to an almighty God for their basic existence after their first devastating winter of this new land was behind them.

One of the first declarations regarding the day of Thanksgiving comes from the State of New Hampshire in 1782 and reads, “The United States in Congress assembled, taking into their consideration the many instances of divine goodness to these States:[...] Do hereby recommend to the inhabitants of these States in general, the observation of THURSDAY the twenty-eight day of NOVEMBER next, as a day of solemn THANKSGIVING to GOD for all his mercies: and they do further recommend to all ranks, to testify to their gratitude to GOD for his goodness, by a cheerful obedience of his laws, and by promoting, each in his station, and by his influence, the practice of true and undefiled religion, which is the great foundation of public prosperity and national happiness.”[2]

No ambiguity there. Clearly, such a clear-cut and stark statement of religious faith today would send deep shivers across our sophisticated sensibilities that have demonstrated here-to-fore impossible capacities of tolerance for the bizarre and profane but not, indeed, for “the practice of true and undefiled religion.” We have the zealous promoters of a “secular” and “inclusive” society to thank for that. They have waged a carefully articulated war against the mixing of the sacred and the secular seeking libertine license for themselves while denying that morality has anything to do with “the foundation of public prosperity and national happiness.” Not content with their victory in judicial and political precedents, they have moved to expunge even the memory of our religious heritage as a nation. How do you do that? History is subverted to tell us that Pilgrims were thankful to Indians for bringing food. Evidently they have done their job well.

The telling of our nation’s history is critical to our sense of identity and the continuance of our values. It is the front line of our culture wars. Don’t assume anything. Question everything. Beware of strangers bearing texts published after 1970. Don’t drink the cultural water. We are in a fight, and the enemy takes no prisoners.


[1]Cornelius Plantinga, Jr., “Assurances of the Heart” Christianity Today, Vol. 39, no. 13.
[2]Thanksgiving Proclamation State of New-Hampshire. In Committee of Safety, Exeter, November 1, 1782