Thanksgiving Day

 

Thanksgiving Day helps Americans discover the importance of thanking God for every gift and see His hands in providentially taking care of them.

This national holiday of giving Thanks to God for all His gifts and benefits is important for our American culture. While many are discovering the beauty of thanksgiving, others fail to remember God and continue to attribute their own successes and material achievements to themselves.

Thanksgiving Day is a reminder for all Americans that God in His providence-- takes care of all our needs. It is also a reminder that we is not self-sufficient, but rather depend totally upon God our creator and that we is the steward of God’s gifts.

Many pastors attempt to help people understand the meaning of thanksgiving and that all they have is a gift from God and that they are merely the stewards of these gifts.

We know from Sacred Scripture Jesus, as our model, constantly gave thanks to God. Before raising Lazarus from the dead, He said, “Father I give you thanks that you have heard me.” When He multiplied the loaves, He took the loaves, and after giving thanks, distributed them and the fishes to those who were reclining. At the institution of the Eucharist, Our Lord gave thanks before blessing the bread and wine which truly became His body and blood at the Last Supper.

The letters of St. Paul often begin and end with thanksgiving. St. Paul also urged the Church in his letter to the Thessalonians, “In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ, Jesus.”

The Gospel of the ten lepers helps us to understand the importance of being thankful, but is also reveals our failure to thank God for His gifts and blessings. After the lepers had departed because Jesus had told them to show themselves to the priests, they realized Our Lord healed them. However, only one returned to thank Our Divine Savior. In a loud voice, he fell on his face at the feet of Jesus, glorifying God. He thanked Our Lord for healing Him, while the others continued on their way to the priests. And so, that is why Our Blessed Lord said, “Ten were cleansed, were they not? Where are the other nine? Have not but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God.”

Perhaps, most know that our first president, George Washington established Thanksgiving as a national holiday. Many of us were taught in school-- the history of Thanksgiving. We were told Puritan pilgrims, from Britain came over on the ship, the Mayflower, and that they gathered with the American Indians at Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts, in the fall of 1621. We were told these pilgrims and Indians gave thanks to God for surviving the hard winter, and for the many blessings-- God had bestowed upon them. We are told that they ate wild turkey and deer meat.

Although this event actually happened, perhaps most are unaware-- the very first Thanksgiving occurred 56 years earlier in 1565 at St. Augustine, Florida. The first settlers were not British Puritans, but rather, Spanish settlers, many of whom were Catholic.

It was on Sept. 8^th, 1565 a Catholic priest by the name of Fr. Francisco Lopez Grjalas, offered a Mass of Thanksgiving and invited all 800 European settlers and the native Indians, for a communal meal, which consisted of wild turkey, deer meat, pork stew, and vegetables.

Today, on Thanksgiving many families pray their prayer before meal-- each family member will go around the table and name at least one thing they are thankful. Naturally, many will thank God for their family, their job, their food, their home, and their health. Some thank God for their talents and for the gift of their life. Others may thank God for His creation, such as the stars, the moon, the sun, the trees, snow and the animals. Those of us who live here can thank God for our wonderful little community. And we are thankful for living sort of out in the country where there is wild life, deer, turkeys, foxes, coyotes and owls.

God loves us and desires that we love our self, love our neighbor and show our love for Him, by using the gifts He has given us in the proper way.

Perhaps with the following words we can thank Our Lord: Thank you Jesus, for your suffering and death on the Cross, by which you came to save us and by which you opened the gates of paradise, so that we may be forever with you in heaven. Thank you Jesus for all the sacraments, most especially yourself in the Holy Eucharist, the Holy Mass and Holy Communion. Thank you Jesus for my baptism, in which You washed away original sin, and the Trinity came to dwell within me. Thank you Jesus for Confession where you forgive our personal sins. Thank you Jesus for the Last Rites whereby you forgive our sins, give us grace to perservere through suffering and You prepare us for eternal life in heaven.

Thank you Jesus for the Church, you established and promised that the gates of hell will not prevail. Thank you Jesus for the deposit of faith. Thank you Jesus for the pope, cardinals, bishops and priests You give to us as shepherds.

Thank you Jesus for all the martyrs and saints, who give us an example of how to grow in holiness and virtue. Thank you Jesus for humbling yourself to come down from heaven into the Immaculate womb of the Virgin Mary, in which you took upon our human nature, so beneath Your dignity. Thank you Jesus for being born in a cold stable-- with no lay place to lay Your head, but upon the straw- in a manger in the little town of Bethlehem.

Thank you Jesus for Your life, your miracles, your teachings, and for revealing the Blessed Trinity to us The Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons in one God! Thank you Jesus for Your agony in the Garden, Your scourging, Your crowning with thorns, Your carrying of the Cross, and for shedding Your blood-- during Your three hours of agony on the Cross. Thank you Jesus for showing us the value of suffering. Thank you Jesus for making suffering redemptive. Thank you for every suffering I have ever endured in my life, because by suffering I am like you, who suffered so much for me. And thank you Jesus for rising from the dead, conquering sin and death and opening the gates of paradise.

My friends, let us give thanks to Jesus for all He done for us and give thanks to God for your every gift and use your gifts for the glory and honor of God and for the good of your neighbor, by doing so, you will be true disciples of Jesus and when that day in the future comes, when you will be called to that eternal home, when you arrive with a grateful heart you will cry out, Thank Jesus, my God, for the greatest gift of all—the gift of heaven—the gift of being with you forever!