Thanksgiving 2009

I hope you all have a thankful and tranquil season!

With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. And you will say in that day:
Give thanks to the LORD,
     call on his name;
make known his deeds among the nations;
     proclaim that his name is exalted.
Sing praises to the LORD, for he has done gloriously;
     let this be known in all the earth.
Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion,
     for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah 12:3-6 (NRSV)

 Three hundred ninety years ago, December 4, 1619, one year 17 days before the Pilgrims in Massachusetts, (Virginia claims) the first Europeans celebrated thanksgiving in Virginia at the Berkeley Plantation on historic Route 5 southeast of Richmond. 

Today, days before Thanksgiving, school children are rehearsing the traditional play about pilgrims and Indians. Many women have planned the menus for the Thursday feast and bought the turkey to begin thawing in the fridge. Chances are, many have already done much of their Christmas shopping, a significant part of it online.

The National Retail Federation (NRF) predicts that this season shoppers will spend an average of $682, down from last year. Many Americans feel strapped. Associated Press today reports that “people carry an average of about $46,000 in debt – mortgages, credit cards, auto loans and other consumer debt. That’s a far bigger load than in the early 1980s when the jobless rate last topped 10 percent. In 1982 per capita debt totaled about $14,000 in today’s dollars.”

Thanksgiving has become merely an historic marker on the Interstate between Halloween and Christmas—Turkey Day, way less important than Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving when many businesses cross into the black for the year, and Cyber Monday, the online shopping milestone.

 Those of us who long to renew our minds and spirits will have to consciously change how we observe the holidays.

Some of us have no choice. Grief has scarred our hearts. Violence has taken loved ones from families of service members or peace officers and crime survivors. Suicide has inexplicably ripped families apart. Disease and death have robbed some of us of health and loved ones.

Change begins with verbs. One writer reminded me of the fundamental verbs of life: to want, to have, to do, and—to be!

The substance of the New Testament word for mind and heart change, metanoia, concerns to be. We can cultivate healthful change in our souls during the season by giving them some silence, some room to be. We sing “Silent Night,” but never experience one. Just for a few minutes a day during Advent,  the period of preparation before Christ’s birth, try turning off the car radio, or the television, or the computer. These moments of silence can give us time to draw water from the well of our salvation.

I thank God for you.