Pass The Stuffing

I think I'd like to have a nice, traditional Thanksgiving this year. Don't we always? That means potatoes, gravy, yams, cranberry sauce, rolls, pumpkin pie and of course, stuffed turkey and stuffed relatives. So, we fix this amazingly huge meal, eat more than we ought to and pretend that it is somehow connected to our heritage. Nothing could be further from the truth.

When I was in grade school, every year on Thanksgiving week we would color pictures of turkeys, Pilgrims and Indians. People would talk about how much they were going to eat and whose house they were going to for the feast.

The thing that is troubling me this year is that we don't celebrate and give thanks for a bounteous harvest, and that we have lost the connection between the current 'tradition' and the origin of that tradition. Thanksgiving is about... food, right? Oh, sure, some people actually try to remember 'all their blessings' and give thanks for them. But, to me the ritual seems a bit shallow and disconnected. Shouldn't we give thanks every day for all our blessings. The Day of Thanksgiving then could be given to a special thanks for a specific blessing. That is what used to be the 'tradition'. Remember that the Pilgrims were escaping oppression in Europe. They were willing to live in the wilderness and risk their lives so that they might live and worship in a free land. But the land was far from hospitable! Strange climate, unknown diseases, hunger, and hostile natives were the every day tragedies faced by these determined settlers. But they would rather die free men in want and exile than live under tyranny. Many of them did die. Some of the Indians, who could see that all of the people were going to perish if they didn't get help, decided to teach the settlers a little bit about the climate, gardening and survival. Because of their compassion and help, the Pilgrims were able to barely survive, and finally to reap a harvest, for which they felt a great need to give thanks, not only to the God whom they served, but to the Indians whom God had sent to deliver them!

I quote from an original Pilgrim journal:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which time, among other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed upon our governor, and upon the captain, and others. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty."

Yes, I think I would like to have a traditional Thanksgiving feast. I would like to invite the descendants of Massasoit to my table, prepare home-grown bounty which I had planted, raised and prayed over. Then I would like to remember the sacrifices, the convictions, the hardships and the successes of the people who gave us the tradition of Thanksgiving in this country. They knew, as we have never known, the connection between our Maker, the land, the rain, the harvest, good friends and survival. They celebrated and gave tearful and heartfelt gratitude to God and their wise friends the Indians, for survival, freedom and temporary abundance. They also knew that their abundance was temporary and must be renewed each year, along with their gratitude for the blessing of religious liberty. We, on the other hand, eat little at our feast that we ourselves have harvested, stuff ourselves to the point of illness, forget the connection between our survival, the land, our freedom and God, and have almost completely lost sight of the fact that if it weren't for some of the kindly original inhabitants of this country the story of the Pilgrims would have been a short tragedy of starvation and death.