As these November days get darker, the world seems to get darker as well. In the war between Israel and Hamas, over 11,000 people have been killed, most of them civilians. In the dark and frigid North, the Russia-Ukraine War drags on into its third year. As of this Monday morning, our federal government is still paralyzed over debt and spending and many people are looking to next year’s election with great anxiety. Our own city is coming apart at the seams, as it struggles to provide even the most basic care for the more than 20,000 migrants who have squeaked across the border and then put on buses to Chicago. Crime generally flourishes in darkness, and that is bad news for a city with way too much crime already. Our churches have never fully recovered from the COVID shutdown, and disaffiliation with organized religion continues unabated. Then there is the overriding issue of climate change, which constantly gets put on the back burner, even though it is ultimately the most pressing issue of all. And all of this does not even touch the more personal concerns we have about ourselves and our loved ones. Are we really celebrating Thanksgiving this week?

Something that we may not realize, though, is that the national observance of Thanksgiving began during an even worse time in history. President Lincoln established this holiday in 1863, when our country was engaged in a Civil War, a war that cost 500,000 American lives. Lincoln knew that even in our darkest moments we have reason to be grateful. What follows is a portion of his official Proclamation of Thanksgiving. Perhaps reading these words will make you think about what you should put on your gratitude list this year:

“The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we ae prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the watchful providence of Almighty God, In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals have yielded even more abundantly that heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

“No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us for our sins hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they 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 of November 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.”

On some Thanksgivings we have to dig a little deeper to be grateful, but it is always worth it. Gratitude teaches us not to assume too much, not to feel entitled, and not to hold the things we have so tightly to ourselves. Everything is gift.

                                                                               Fr. Joe