Minutes of Meetings with God
and with Myself

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Thanksgiving Day ...

Thanksgiving Day looms ever larger in importance this year as we come nearer to it. The tumult and disasters of the past months weigh heavily and force me into a struggle to find meanings and hope. The frenzy of military action, of diplomatic initia-tives, and of heightened security measures in "The War on Terrorism" fail to help me feel anymore at ease about the state of the world. The aggravating and unsettling questions, "What next?" and "What now?" dog me.

Somehow, Thanksgiving Day presents itself as a sort of gateway to meaningfulness and hope. That "somehow" has almost nothing to do with either the superficial observances of "Turkey Day" that have so characterized our society for the last several decades, or the romanticized renditions of the first Thanksgiving that picture pilgrims and Indians in their finery feasting around tables heaped with food.

Thanksgiving Day has much more to it than all that.The first Thanksgiving lasted more than a day; it lasted three days. It was a harvest celebration by a small group of some fifty survivors who had made it through a brutal winter and a back-breaking summer at Cape Cod in 1620-21. On the one hand, those fifty were all that was left of more than one hundred refugees who had fled religious persecution in England by first going to the Netherlands; on the other hand, those fifty were all that remained of one hundred religious idealists who had crossed the Atlantic Ocean to build a utopia that they hoped would embody all the elements of the Kingdom of God. They had set out for the Americas convinced "that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties and must be both enterprised and overcome with answerable courages."

The 63 day voyage was hard and the ship almost broke apart. When the company had arrived in the Americas, "what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men - and what multitudes of them they knew not."

It is said, "In these hard and difficult beginnings they found some discontents and murmurings arise amongst some, and mutinous speeches and carriages in others; but they were soon quelled and overcome by the wisdom, patience, and just equal carriage of things, by the governor and the better part, which clave faithfully together in the main. But that which was most sad and lamentable was, that in two or three months' time half their company had died …"

Scurvy and other diseases, as well as the cold took a horrible toll on the little band of utopians. At the lowest point, there were only seven who were able bodied enough to take care of the rest (they cooked, cut wood, bathed, clothed, and did every-thing for the sick). Some days, those seven buried two or three of their compatriots who had died. Each person was given a daily ration of five kernels of corn to sustain them. Almost all of the women died because they suffered the added rigors and dangers of childbirth. The amazing thing was, when the Spring came, and the ship could once again set sail, only the crew boarded to leave.

The survivors all stayed. They began the arduoustasks of clearing the land in order to farm it and of building better houses so that they would not be so hard pressed by the bitterness of the winter cold and snow. From the natives, they learned how to plant crops, to gather fruit and nuts and berries, to fish, and to hunt fowl and animals.

When the summer was done, the survivors had harvested enough that they could count on a winter ration of a peck of grain and a peck of corn per person per week. That meant each could have at least a large loaf of corn bread every day. That was supplemented by smoked and preserved fish, fowl (duck, goose and turkey), and venison. It meant that, if every thing went well and the coming winter was no worse or no longer than the last one, everyone would almost have enough to eat until Spring.

After having suffered so much, after struggling through all the nearly devastating changes in their lives, after having worked so hard to just begin to re-make the new world into which they had chosen to live, the band of utopians celebrated with the feast we now call "Thanksgiving." The small band of religious idealists, who had come to the Americas to be "the light on the hill" so others could see and know the reality of the Kingdom of God, ate with their Native neighbors in sight of the cemetery. Each of those utopians, as they ate their Thanksgiving meals, could see the grave that held a spouse, a child, or a dear friend.

The meanings and hope to which Thanksgiving is the gateway lies beyond the obstacle of "food piled high." Through that gateway is the challenge and model presented by the selfless actions of seven people who "did all the homely and necessary offices for them [the sick and the dying] which dainty and queasy stomachs cannot endure to hear named; and all this willingly and cheerfully, without any grudging in the least, showing herein their true love unto their friends and brethren; a rare example and worthy to be remembered." Thanksgiving is about self-transcending heroism that won't leave in danger and that does what needs to be done to save others, to save the community, and to save the dream of a better world.

Through that gateway is a profound experience of the presence of God despite the press and trouble of surrounding circumstances. Those utopians of the first Thanksgiving did not see God's punishment in all their sufferings and afflictions. Rather, they saw God's saving power working to ultimately uphold them and to see them through the various calamities that befell them until they Kingdom would come.

Finally, through that gateway is the rare example of the unrelenting pursuit of the only worthy dream, experiencing the reality of the Kingdom of God in the here and now. Although caught in the turmoil and paradox of the present reality, those utopians never lost sight of their dream. They did not seek to avoid the hard reality "that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties and must be [undertaken with daring, energy and courage]." "So they committed themselves to the will of God and resolved to proceed."

Amen!