Hmm, that strikes me as a bit much. Harvest festivals are eminently and appropriately Catholic, and Thanksgiving is simply an American harvest festival with a touch of successful-voyage festival. Successful-voyage festivals are also eminently and appropriately Catholic. The Spanish explorers who settled St. Augustine held a very Thanksgiving-like thanksgiving festival there.
One does not have to become an apologist for every act of one’s country in order to participate in an event that has secular or civic elements. There would be nothing to owe Caesar in that instance. Nor would there be much to owe one’s friends and family, since these people inescapably live in a particular place and time in history and must be interacted with and served in a context that includes the backdrop of one’s imperfect, or even profoundly immoral, civic setting.
Yes, the Puritans were dour, deplorable heretics. But I don’t think they should be given an unearned monopoly on turkey and dressing.
November 23, 2016
Hmm, that strikes me as a bit much. Harvest festivals are eminently and appropriately Catholic, and Thanksgiving is simply an American harvest festival with a touch of successful-voyage festival. Successful-voyage festivals are also eminently and appropriately Catholic. The Spanish explorers who settled St. Augustine held a very Thanksgiving-like thanksgiving festival there.
One does not have to become an apologist for every act of one’s country in order to participate in an event that has secular or civic elements. There would be nothing to owe Caesar in that instance. Nor would there be much to owe one’s friends and family, since these people inescapably live in a particular place and time in history and must be interacted with and served in a context that includes the backdrop of one’s imperfect, or even profoundly immoral, civic setting.
Yes, the Puritans were dour, deplorable heretics. But I don’t think they should be given an unearned monopoly on turkey and dressing.