In the Name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Thanksgiving Day is America’s oldest national holiday, and its history is worth reviewing. In 1620 the Mayflower pilgrims in the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts gave thanks for their survival, against great odds, in what was to them the wilderness of an utterly New World. Joining them in their Thanksgiving feast were Native Americans, who had given the pilgrims indispensable assistance and to whom America was not a new world at all. The observance of Thanksgiving Day was given fresh, political, impetus by President George Washington in 1789, following the War of Independence from Britain and more than a decade of birth pangs for the emerging United States. In 1863, in the autumn following the decisive Civil War Battles of Vicksburg and Gettyburg, President Abraham Lincoln invested Thanksgiving Day with the significance of what he called a “new birth of freedom.” By 1942, in the midst of the Second World War, Thanksgiving Day had attained thoroughly national status as President Franklin Roosevelt told the nation in his proclamation of Thanksgiving Day, “[We] find our Republic and the nations joined with it waging a battle on many fronts for the preservation of liberty.” As time has gone on, the depth of Thanksgiving Day has grown as a national litany of gratitude for the blessings of life, liberty and justice.
In the days following 9/11, the grace of thanksgiving was much in evidence among New Yorkers. Churches were full. People were grateful to be alive. They cherished their most basic privileges as citizens of a free country. There were wonders, noted in the news media, in the those days: less aggression on the sidewalks; less honking of horns on the streets; and on subways there were frequent instances of giving up seats to the elderly and to mothers with little children. New York’s response to a grievous wound made one proud to be part of the city. But that faded after about a year. Although we are wary of another 9/11, we are also getting back to normal. Thanksgiving is a state of grace – it takes work to make it an habitual virtue.
Though Thanksgiving is a holiday by annual Presidential proclamation and has developed through the great moments of American history, it is by no means restricted to the blessings of the national, political sphere. It is also deeply personal and profoundly spiritual, rooted in the soil of Holy Scripture and the faith of all believers in God.
The thankful spirit is grateful for the gift of life, for one’s own unique being, identity, and gifts, and for the people, places and circumstances of one’s own life. Moreover, all our great spiritual traditions teach us that we can learn to be thankful, not only for the overt blessings of life, but for the covert blessings, the blessings in disguise, even the afflictions which test and refine the character. “It is good for me,” says the Psalmist, “that I have been in trouble; that I might learn thy statutes.” The Apostle Paul, writing from prison, says it admirably: “I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound, in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want.” (Phil 4:11-13). This is the grace of thanksgiving, a tonic against envy and all sourness of soul.
When I was a small boy I would occasionally get myself caught in what might be called a “brat trap.” Some might describe this as having “an attitude.” Surliness and churlishness are not something confined to childhood. We all know about it. It’s when we find ourselves habitually choosing to be offended by people or circumstances, constantly finding fault. We seem regularly to have our noses out of joint.
Whenever she spotted me in such an unattractive state, my mother would move swiftly and surely. “Young man,” she would say, “wipe that look off your face.” And then, invariably, she would add, “Count your blessings, young man, count your blessings. Every last one of them.” A few days before my sixtieth birthday and long since her death, I find my mother’s words still govern me – or at least they should.
My mother knew that once I thought of my blessings, if I really got started counting them in detail, they would overwhelm whatever it was that had annoyed me. The cause of offence would seem embarrassingly small next to the greatness of the blessings. Thanksgiving is a powerful, positive disposition of the soul. It is a grace we can receive, a habit we can learn, and a virtue we can acquire. And we can start by counting our blessings.
In the Name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Amen.
