Chris Gehrz’s Reminder For Thanksgiving

Chris Gehrz:

So this Thanksgiving, enjoy the turkey, cranberries, and pumpkin pie. For all my talk of “humble penitence,” it’s long been a feast, not a fast. As early as 1864, the second “national day of Thanksgiving,” a Washington newspaper was already reporting on “that estimable feature of the occasion, the Thanksgiving Dinner, which sent up its appetizing odor throughout the length and breadth of the city.” And Ron Chernow’s new biography of Ulysses Grant reminded me that some 80,000 pounds worth of turkeys were donated to feed the Union troops besieging Petersburg.

But don’t stop there. Let this Thursday be something more like what Abraham Lincoln had in mind: an occasion to turn away from the future and choose to remember the past year with gratitude, to turn away from pride and see your limitations more clearly, and to turn away from selfishness and recommit to service and reconciliation.

At the link you can read the whole and wonderful post.