THANKFUL! REALLY? WHY?

By Edwin Cooney

“Dad,” my eldest son once observed, “you think too much!”  He’s right, of course. I do, but as I see it, many things ought to be pondered - for perspective if for no other benefit!  So this week I’m thinking about gratitude in its many forms and circumstances.  After all, this Thursday America will celebrate its one hundred and fifty-third official Thanksgiving since 1863. 

Incredibly, in the midst of America’s greatest war, the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln (with the prodding of Sarah Josepha Hale, the editor of the “American Ladies Magazine”) decided it was time to be thankful for the blessings that nature and nature’s God had bestowed on us all.

Thus, it has become not only traditional but politically correct to be thankful to Nature and Providence every November.  Since 1941, the fourth Thursday in November has been designated Thanksgiving Day.  (Actually, I think the Canadians celebrate their Thanksgiving Day more sensibly than we do as it seldom if ever snows on the second Monday in October!)  The question that most readily comes to mind is: what ought we to be thankful for? The second most obvious question is: to whom ought we be thankful?

We ought to be most thankful for our ability to weather the many storms that invariably threaten our safety and our peace.  We ought to be thankful for stout hearts and fertile minds, and for our free society.  Most of all, we ought to be thankful for one another.

We’ve been taught since the second or third grade that the Pilgrim Fathers celebrated the first Thanksgiving with the Wampanoag Indians. Hence, we ought to thank them for starting one hell of a white American tradition.  The only problem is they’re not around to receive our gratitude.  Most of us, of course, have been taught that God or Providence ought to receive our gratitude as our greatest benefactor.  However, it would be a little disconcerting for many to learn that even our Pilgrim Fathers were a little slow and inconsistent with their gratitude.  One might note that the year after the Pilgrim Fathers celebrated the first Thanksgiving they celebrated the second one only after rain ended a season-long drought. However, that second celebration was the last Thanksgiving celebration until 1676 -- fifty-four years later.  The year 1676 was the year Massachusetts Puritans, who’d replaced the Pilgrim Fathers, won their war over those same Wampanoag Indians.  Between 1622 and the 1660s, Puritan Massachusetts had subdued every Indian tribe in and around the colony.

The Wampanoags under Metacom, the son of Massasoit (the original protector of the Pilgrim Fathers), had turned on white Massachusetts and resisted them far more successfully than had any other tribe. Metacom was also known as King Philip for his European dress and style. Upon their inevitable victory, Puritan Massachusetts gladly gave God credit and gratitude for their grizzly triumph.  That assumes, of course, that God glorifies, as we do, victory in war! (Note that even if the Almighty approved the Puritan’s victory over Metacom, God certainly didn’t approve the manner of their celebration.  The centerpiece of the celebration was Metacom’s head atop a spike in downtown Boston.) Thus, here’s another question.  Ought we to thank God for an achievement which God never sought or perhaps even approved?  President Lincoln was humble enough to pray out loud that rather than hoping that God was on our side, we ought to pray that we are on God’s side.

We offer our annual gratitude because we’ve been taught that an act of kindness, support, or love deserves humble acknowledgment.    Like our Pilgrim and Puritan Fathers, we feel increasingly insecure in 2015 amidst the threats of a religion and culture foreign to white Christian America.  As the Puritan Fathers of 1676 did, we pray for a Thanksgiving Day not far ahead when we might once again thank God for still another victory in war.  Again, that assumes that God or Providence thirsts for our gratitude as we thirst for the gratitude of our families, friends, neighbors, and others when we freely provide assistance and support during times of crisis.

I certainly hope and even suspect that we will survive the saber rattling of ISIS, but to expect God or Providence to play any roll in our earthly conflicts to me trivializes the most valuable trait we possess.

Back in 2007, I wrote my first commentary on the history and value of American Thanksgiving.  Near the close of that commentary, I asserted that the greatest gift we’ve received from nature and nature’s God was wisdom.

Wisdom grants us the capacity to discern right from wrong, good judgment from recklessness, reality from fear and, of course, justice and love from angry revenge.

Thus, for many Thanksgiving Days to come let’s appreciate and thank one another for the collective wisdom that keeps us safe, prosperous and free.

Finally, we would do well to remember the final phrase of President John F. Kennedy’s 1961 Inaugural Address:

“…here on earth, God’s work must truly be our own!”

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY