Scriptorium Daily
This Thanksgiving morning fear may replace well-fed and complacent gratitude in many homes. Times are tough and seem to be getting tougher.
What is going to happen next?
Our economic experts give us mixed answers, for economics, the “dismal science,” is inexact. Everybody has his own way of knowing when economic times are getting dark. Some economists watch the Wal-Mart parking lot (which is full), others monitor Starbucks’ sales (which are down), but I check prayer requests.
Every Wednesday a small group of college honors students gather in my house for evening prayer and Bible study. Prayer requests for alum, parents and current students to find jobs or fears about employment are growing.
Here on the edge of the Holidays, it is hard for many to find much for which to be thankful.
Hundreds of Holiday specials tried to prepare us for this day. The Grinch could not steal Christmas… since it was in the Who’s hearts. However, as we are about to discover, while “tooters to toot” are not essential for the party, a total lack of “roast beast” can make it hard for all but the most virtuous to feast.
Outside of cultural holdouts like church and Hallmark, the lesson of the Christmas specials is forgotten, and it is a hard lesson to learn quickly. Our considerations of what is important must include the transcendent as well as the material. Even some important temporal relationships, like family, are only satisfying when they are based on virtues like moderation and charity.
Having experienced the Great Depression, my strong, West Virginian grandmothers would put it this way: hard times can be good for us. Though many people curse tough economic times, my grandmothers knew to be thankful, and expected God to use them to be the tutor for deeper
internal lessons in virtue.
Merely Hallmarking about learning virtue is no good. We need a path to follow and the grace to do so, which Jesus Christ provides. Our hard times, our little crosses, are not for their own sakes, but to transform us into His image. Too much stuff, even too much food, can dull our realization of how much more we need. Knowing there will be fewer things under the tree this year has been good for my children as we seek to look forward to the abundance of Heaven.
There is never a crash in the value of faith, hope, and charity.
Consumer culture has focused the Holiday season on consumption. The Church was wiser by placing a time of fasting, Advent, before the feast.
As John the Baptist was to Jesus, so Thanksgiving is a forerunner to the greater feast to come. The suffering in the middle, Advent, makes us ready for the celebration. Feasting is best when it comes after fasting. Self-denial is not for its own sake, but for the deeper lessons of the soul that make real jollification possible.
This Thanksgiving morning, in my family, we will rejoice in each other as we prepare for the fast of Advent. After our forerunner feast, we will eat less, consume less, and prepare during Advent for the great feast at Christmas. All of this will be a reminder, if a reminder is needed in these stressed times, that after night comes dawn, after suffering comes reward, and after the moment of death comes Paradise on the real Thanksgiving morn.
