The first Thanksgiving, and several of those after weren't Christian Religious Events at all. According to the histories I have read, about 1/2 the attendees weren't Christians at all, and none of them were Evangelicals BTW. So why Giving Thanks was indeed part of the first event, it wasn't even a majority Christian Event, and definitely not Christian in the sense of the dominate modern sects.

ROFLMAO

It's not even a religious holiday in the civic sense of the term. Think about it, Thanksgiving's main symbols have ALWAYS been a turkey, some pumpkin pie, maybe some red and orange leaves, and that horn of fruit.

Thanksgiving as a public holiday has NEVER been about religion. Thanksgiving as a personal holiday might be about something different - If you want to thank God, Allah, Lady Luck, or Karl Rove for all the blessings fo the past year at your dinner table, that's fine with me. Just don't invite me unless you've got some damned good pie.

I swear if religious fanatics ruin this holiday - which I love precisely because it's a time of getting together with none of the controversy or commercialism of Christmas - if they go all war on thanksgiving on me I'm going to declare a war on all wars on holidays. It's getting to the point where it's absurd.

What's next? A "War on the secularization of Halloween?" I mean it does come the Holiday All Saint's Day, and frankly, I'm just afraid that kids think its all about ghouls, goblins, and candy. Whatever happened to remembering all those who died over the past year? What happened to wishing them a peaceful transition to Heaven? Remember what Jesus said, "Tis better to treat than to trick"? And who is this Jack O'Lantern anyways? I never liked the Irish much and this smacks of Idol worship...

What would you like to call a group of people who emigrate to a vast wilderness full of dangers, so they can worship their God in the manner they want? Sounds like people who are pretty centered in their belief system and willing to act on their beliefs.

Stop-truth-decay:

What would you like to call a group of people who emigrate to a vast wilderness full of dangers, so they can worship their God in the manner they want? Sounds like people who are pretty centered in their belief system and willing to act on their beliefs.

They were everything you say, and more, but not evangelicals. The Plymouth colony settlers were religious separatists. They wished only to be let alone. They were not willing to offer religious freedom to other nonconformists in "their" colony when other settlers came. That's why William Penn's settlement was so remarkable. Pennsylvania offered religious freedom, a novel concept at that time.

analogboy490:

if they go all war on thanksgiving on me I'm going to declare a war on all wars on holidays.

I wish all the presumptious fundies would just STFU. In a more diplomatic way: I find myself wondering exactly how the benevolent creator of the universe feels about these antagonistic my-way-or-the-highway people who believe they are entitled to claim every holiday in the name of their little denominational sect. Jesus response to that was simple - was man made for the Sabbath or was the Sabbath made for man?

What would the Flying Spaghetti Monster Do?

Finally, a word of advice: Don't mess with the Irish.

TO ALL THOSE CLAIMING TO KNOW WHAT THE PILGRAMS WERE ABOUT LISTEN UP.My 9th great grandfather was a man called thomas e. collins.he was a distiller of alchohol.as one of the117 people on the mayflower (btw.there were only 34 religious pilgrims on board)the rest were like my ancestor ,people trying to get away from religious control of thier lives. the 34 pilgrams were called the self rightious 34 according to my ancesters letters and journals.they were not seen as people that anyone wanted to associate with .constantly griping about the voyage ,screeming to turn back did not endear themselves to anyone.When landing on the rock(soley because they ran ouyof beer the only safe thing to drink.)the 34 seperated themselves from the rest.SDo do not think history is true anytime religious nut are involved in telling the story.they tend to leave out quit a bit of truth and mostly lie about the rest.

Yes the fundies are annoying but so are the PC fundies who demand we bow down to the cult of victimhood and repent for our sins and our very existance. A lot of this nonsence starts PC proclomations. The same impulse to control and to feel moral superiority, drives the religious and the PC fundies. And yes it does sound like an attack on (Thanksgiving, Columbus Day, Christmas etc) which provokes the inevitable response.

Yes history is, and continues to be ugly, but to spend one day being thankful for the good and reconnecting with your family should foster better social impulses.

I would agree that spending a day giving thanks ought to raise people's minds above their prejudices. I'm just not seeing any evidence of it. It's a pity.

A couple of years ago I was getting daily emails about the attack on Christmas and how one retail chain or another was instructing its employees not to wish customers a Merry Christmas. The email went on from there and ended with an exhortation to "reclaim Christmas" as a religious holiday. I guess one was supposed to reclaim Christmas by shopping at other stores; that was never quite clear.

There never was an attack; rather, the so-called attack on Christmas was a shameful but brilliant strategy by whoever created it. The idea was to extend the "US" vs "them" division into a new area of life. Adding Thanksgiving to the "US" holiday list is just more shame.

Has anybody begun to worry about the Druid influence on Arbor Day? After all, didn't the Prophet Jeremiah first tell us that the sacred trees were to be cut down and burned as a sacrifice? Why are we still planting trees, then?

Hello!!!! They were Protestants--looking for a place where to worship God freely. And, though they didn't celebrate Thanksgiving as a religious event, they did it on their religious foundation and beliefs. It's not a religious holiday, but we just want to thank God on this day especially because a lot of good came out that event and it wasn't only the food.

You thank your deity and I will just thank the deity of the vine. No harm no foul. I think the only good that came out of it was the American Poultry Producers and marketing companies. The added caloric ingestation is hardly good for the overall health of the people.

FIRST NATIONAL THANKSGIVING PROCLAMATION

[Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor; and

Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me "to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness":

Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the Beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted; for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplication to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations, and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our national government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a government of wise, just and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally, to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand, at the City of New York, the 3d day of October, AD 1789 - George Washington

That in the context of the times, the gratitude codified in this holiday was to God, as one would expect a Christian's gratitude to be. But gratitude for one's circumstances isn't a peculiarly Christian trait; we pantheistic Buddhists seek to cultivate gratitude, as well. Indeed, the atheists and agnostics I've known--and the atheist and agnostic I once was on my journey here (which may be just a stop on a journey I've yet to take)--all possess generosity and gratitude in no less measure than the Catholics with whom I grew up (I left the Catholic church around age 17).

Food, wine, friends and family; gratitude; the turning of fall into winter . . . Do we need an essentially anthropomorphic deity for these things to be of value? Can a holiday, a holy day, not speak to whatever we find holy in the essential message of the holiday, whatever it is we revere and hold sacred in our own lives?