Thursday, November 24, 2016

Homily: Thanksgiving 2016: Abraham Lincoln's Promulgation of Thanksgiving Day

In the middle of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be celebrated on the final Thursday in November. 

The great president of emancipation wrote:

“The gracious gifts of the Most High God…should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one 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 next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.  And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and Union.”

Thanksgiving Day is a civil holiday, yes.  But President Lincoln was not hesitant in urging Americans to turn to the God of Creation in thanksgiving and praise for his blessings.

In a few weeks, the busyness of the Christmas season will be upon us, and we will be reminded to keep the Christ in Christmas, to remember that his glorious and saving birth is the reason for our celebration.  Today, I think, we do well, to keep the Thanks in Thanksgiving.  To recall the blessings of our life, food, shelter, family, the beauty of nature, and of course our faith. 

In the Gospel, 10 lepers received healing, but it was the one leper, who returned to the Lord to give thanks who was saved.  True thanksgiving opens our hearts to the eternal.  True thanks is not just focused on the things of this earth, but sees in them goods that come from God, which we have a responsibility to use wisely.

President Lincoln also encouraged humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience. A scourge of atheism and indifference to God have certainly swept over our land: a selfishness, entitlement, and gluttony fill the hearts of many. But Selfishness and thanksgiving are like oil and water.

In our first reading, St. Paul prayed in thanksgiving to God for the grace bestowed upon the Corinthian community, yet we know that grace was not always used; the Corinthians were a divided community, a community which often allowed the perversity of the pagan culture to dictate their behavior instead of the charity and wisdom of God.


So we certainly pray in thanksgiving for the blessings of our lives today, but also for the wisdom to put those blessings, firstly, in service to God, for the needs of the poor, for the building up of the church, for the glory of God and salvation of souls. 

1 comment:

  1. Fr. Estabrook I really enjoyed and appreciated today's sermon!! Given the circumstances under which President Lincoln created the holiday and the prayer he wrote, it contrasts so sharply with the civic unrest we now see. Lincoln and the country as a whole were far more religious than we are today - even as we were killing each other. So many American are very religious, but so many are not. We as a country have to come back to God and your weaving Lincoln and Thanksgiving into today's Gospel is simply brilliant; I posted it on my FB timeline. Thank You! Happy Thanksgiving to you, Fr. K and both of your families!

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