Thanksgiving is one of our most cherished “Holidays”. One might say it’s the closest thing our nation has to a “Holy Day”. To me that closeness is a good thing. There should be a closeness between the worlds of politics and faith. Most of the history of Thanksgiving certainly points to that “partnership”.
Each year I love to spread the story of Squanto, the Wampanoag Indian who, greeted the Pilgrims in English and taught them how to survive. If there is any figure in history (outside the Bible) who incarnates Joseph (from Genesis) it’s Squanto. Squanto was not only Europeanized he was Catholicized because he was saved from slavery by Spanish monks. So, it is wise to consider our “holiday” as a “Holy Day”.
However, there is a great American figure, whom I hold in high esteem, who represents an attitude contrary to my “partnership” vision. His name is Thomas Jefferson. As our nation spins out of control in a moral environment of “anything goes”, it needs to be appreciated that a small mistake at the beginning of a project can lead to great difficulties. The small mistake that this issue of declaring Thanksgiving to be national holiday can be seen in Jefferson’s opposition to making Thanksgiving a national holiday. He definitely was a Christian but had a deeply negative attitude about “institutional religions”.
Jefferson’s famous “wall between church and state” was so high, that he thought the American government has no place in supporting a holiday that included any reference to a Divinity. Truth be told, most of us have some reservations about “institutional religions”. But when government rejects even a “partnership” with religion it necessarily takes the role of the ruler of religion.
A guy by the name of Montesquieu, a French advocate of early America warned folks like Jefferson and Madison, that a Republic won’t last long with Jefferson’s vision. Without becoming overly dramatic, I note that there are many people who express great concern about our nation’s future. Therefore, I give to you a beautiful quote from another President who didn’t follow Jefferson’s vision. He went so far as to codify the last Thursday in November. It came during the some of the darkest days of our Civil War.
“It has seemed to me fit and proper that these gifts should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people; I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea, and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and a Prayer to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.” (Abraham Lincoln, October 3,1863)