GIVE THANKS:: WE ARE FORTUNATE ONES

Let us celebrate for a day some of the GOOD of our history. There is such value in blessing and celebrating the good, and coming in the opposite spirit to all the darkness and destruction of our past and present.

“Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light, but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness.” (Luke 11:34 ESV)

When I read these words, I know they are true in my heart. I need to be sure my eyes are also seeing beauty and good and justice throughout my day or my heart and body grows sick. I often have to actively seek it out and be intentional to celebrate it. When I see the kindness of a father’s tenderness towards his daughter, when I see a stranger help a mother carry a stroller up the subway stairs, when families take in children that aren’t their own and love them as if they are. Sometimes, I simply want to sit and stare at flowers to get any bit of beauty in that I can.

Today, I am humbled, because truly we are the fortunate ones. Of all the founding colonies, Plymouth is the template for Thanksgiving. Colonies varied in their founding values- some established for strategic trade routes, some seeking gold and wealth, some tobacco cash crops-- as with Jamestown, whose governor was so oppressive in his rule that when the chaplain requested just an hour on Sunday to nourish their souls he was quoted "damn their souls, plant tobacco!" But these are NOT colonies in which our celebration originates-- it is Plymouth which was marked by intercultural cooperation that lead to abundance and celebration. 

I was reading a bit of Plymouth history, and I am in awe of #Squanto. He was twice a slave. First taken back to Europe after being captured by a sea captain, only to later return to his homeland with explorers and find his entire village wiped out by disease. He was then made a slave by a tribe of his own nation. As part of the peace treaty between the settlers and the Massasoit people, Squanto taught the settlers to grow and gather food, and fish. I can’t fathom the thoughts of Squanto’s heart. If he willing to help or if he was obligated, if the experience was healing or hurtful to farm and gather on the same land that all his now deceased relatives once inhabited. But I do know, they chose to break bread together in celebration of a successful harvest, and of the peace between two people groups. Of all the suffering, strife, conflict and selfishness— we can choose to celebrate what is GOOD.