[Rhodes22-list] The Real Meaning of Thanksgiving

[Claude Cox]

Good thoughts , Rummy; thanks, and the same to  you.
Claude
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <R22RumRunner at aol.com>
To: <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2007 10:24 AM
Subject: [Rhodes22-list] The Real Meaning of Thanksgiving


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> Happy Thanksgiving!!!
> A special greeting at Thanksgiving time to express  our best wishes for a
> happy and healthy Thanksgiving Day  and a joyous holiday season.
> The Real Meaning of  Thanksgiving
> As we all enjoy turkey and the trimmings this  Thanksgiving, you may be
> interested to know that  the first Thanksgiving celebration in America was 
> a
> completely religious observance that didn't  include a feast.
>
> It occurred in 1619 --  more than a year before the Pilgrims arrived from
> Massachusetts. A group of 38 English settlers  arrived in Virginia and set 
> aside
> a day to give  thanks to God for their safe passage. The  three-day 
> festival
> of food and friendship that was  the origin of Thanksgiving as we know it
> today  didn't occur until 1621.
>
> Not Just a  Private Celebration, a Public Thanks to God
> Ever since, Thanksgiving has been a time for  Americans not just to 
> celebrate
> privately in our  homes but to give public thanks to God -- and not  just 
> for
> our material blessings but for our  freedom. Our earliest Thanksgivings 
> were
> in times  when that freedom was at its most vulnerable.
>
> In 1789, George Washington issued a  proclamation calling for a day of
> "public  thanksgiving and prayer" -- a day for Americans to  acknowledge 
> "the many
> signal favors of Almighty  God, especially by affording them an 
> opportunity
> peaceably to establish a form of government for  their safety and 
> happiness."
>
> But Washington  didn't just say that individual Americans should  thank 
> God.
> He proclaimed that nations --  especially the one-year-old United States 
> of
> America -- have obligations to God as well. He  wrote, "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."
>
> Lincoln Makes It a Yearly  Celebration
>
> But it wasn't until more  than 70 years later -- at a time when America
> faced its greatest crisis -- that Thanksgiving  became a yearly 
> celebration.
>
> The Civil War  was raging. Three months earlier, the Battle of  Gettysburg
> had left 50,000 Americans killed,  wounded or missing. Riots were tearing 
> apart
> American cities.
>
> In the midst of this  chaos, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed in 
> October
> 1863 that the last Thursday of November  should henceforth be set aside as 
> a
> day of  thanksgiving.
>
> Lincoln acknowledged that the  nation was "in the midst of a civil war of
> unequaled magnitude and severity." But he focused  instead on the nation's
> blessings, urging his  fellow Americans to remember that "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 in anger 
> for
> our sins, hath  nevertheless remembered mercy."
>
> And  Lincoln, too, proclaimed that all Americans set  aside the day for a
> public expression of gratitude  to God. He wrote, "It has seemed to me fit 
> and
> proper that they [gifts of God] should be  solemnly, reverently, and 
> gratefully
> acknowledged  as with one heart and one voice by the whole  American 
> people."
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> May the good things of life be yours in abundance, at  Thanksgiving and
> throughout the coming year.
> Rummy
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