I still remember my grandmother’s Thanksgiving table.
Every year she insisted we go around the room and say one thing we were truly grateful for before anyone touched the turkey. Most years it felt awkward, even corny. But now, looking back, I realize she was trying to keep alive something the rest of us had already let slip away: the understanding that Thanksgiving was never really about the meal. It was about who we were thanking.
Somewhere between the Mayflower and the Macy’s parade, we lost that.
The Day That Was Meant to Be Holy
Let’s be honest: most of us treat Thanksgiving like the warm-up act for Black Friday. We stuff ourselves, watch football, maybe post a vague “grateful” caption on social media, and move on. It’s a day off. A long weekend. A carbohydrate coma with cranberry sauce.
But that’s not what it was in 1621.
The people we call the Pilgrims, technically separatist Puritans, didn’t throw a feast because they suddenly loved corn. They held a three-day religious observance because they believed God had spared them. After a brutal Atlantic crossing, a botched landing, near-mutiny, and a first winter that killed half their number, they stood on the edge of the grave and saw themselves miraculously alive.
Their response wasn’t “wow, lucky us.” Their response was worship.
A Gratitude That Had a Direction
Here’s something we rarely stop to consider: you can’t actually be grateful to nobody.
Try it. Say out loud: “I’m so grateful to… the universe.” It feels hollow, doesn’t it? Like sending a thank-you note addressed to “Occupant.” Gratitude, real gratitude, needs a recipient who can hear it, who can receive it. The Pilgrims had no confusion on this point. Their survival wasn’t random chance; it was providence. And providence has a name.
“Having undertaken, for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith…”
Mayflower Compact, 1620
That single sentence in America’s first governing document tells you everything about their mindset. These weren’t casual believers looking for cheap land. They were people who organized an entire colony around the idea that life itself was a gift from a personal God who expected thanks.
When Survival Felt Like a Miracle
Imagine showing up in Massachusetts in November with no houses, no food stores, and a ship full of sick people. Then imagine watching 50 of your 102 companions die in four months. The ones who remained didn’t throw a party because harvest was plentiful (it barely was). They celebrated because they were still breathing.
In their minds, that made the day holy. Not just special. Holy. A deliberate act of corporate worship, prayer, psalm-singing, and yes, eating together, because feasting has always been part of biblical thanksgiving (think Levitical feasts of ancient Israel). The original event wasn’t “Friendsgiving.” It was a covenant renewal ceremony with God as the guest of honor.
How We Slowly Drained the Meaning Out
Fast-forward four centuries and something strange has happened. The only major American holiday that began explicitly as an act of worship to the Christian God is now the most thoroughly secularized. Christmas still has church services and carols. Easter still has sunrise services. Even the Fourth of July nods to “Nature’s God” and “divine Providence” in the founding documents.
Thanksgiving? We’ve turned it into National Overeating Day.
I’m not trying to be the grumpy traditionalist here (okay, maybe a little), but there’s real loss in that shift. When you strip a holiday of its transcendent reason for being, you don’t end up with a neutral day off. You end up with a vacuum. And vacuums get filled.
The New Priests of November
Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does culture. Once we forgot who we were thanking, plenty of people rushed in to tell us what Thanksgiving should “really” be about:
- Colonial oppression and “stolen land” narratives
- Consumerism warm-up (hello, doorbuster ads)
- Vague therapeutic gratitude journals
- Political point-scoring
- “Friendsgiving” as a replacement for family and faith
I’ve seen articles seriously proposing we rename the holiday “Thanks-taking” or “LandBack Day.” The speed with which people will tear down a tradition the moment its core is forgotten should terrify anyone who cares about cultural continuity.
Because here’s the uncomfortable truth: a holiday that is only about “us” doesn’t last. It becomes a hollow ritual we perform until something shinier comes along.
Why Gratitude Needs God (Or At Least a Capital-S Someone)
Modern psychology loves gratitude. There are gratitude apps, gratitude journals, gratitude challenges. And I’m all for it; the research showing mental-health benefits is solid. But almost all of it treats gratitude as a self-help technique rather than a moral response.
That’s like using a cathedral as a gym, beautiful building, nice acoustics, but you’ve missed the entire point of why it was built.
When the Pilgrims gave thanks, they weren’t trying to lower their cortisol levels. They were acknowledging that their lives were not their own, that every breath was borrowed, that goodness came from outside themselves. In an age of radical self-creation, that idea feels almost offensive.
And yet… don’t we feel the emptiness?
The Quiet Ache of a Thankless Culture
We live in the richest society in human history, and yet rates of anxiety, loneliness, and despair keep climbing. We have more reasons to be grateful than any generation before us, and less ability to feel it.
Maybe, just maybe, there’s a connection.
When everything is about me; my rights, my comfort, my self-expression; then nothing is ever enough. The moment the Wi-Fi slows down or the grocery store is out of my favorite oat milk, the world has failed me. Without a sense that life itself is an unearned gift, every inconvenience feels like injustice.
The Pilgrims buried half their loved ones and still called the land “blessed.” We get a rainy parade route and call it tragedy.
What We Can Still Recover
I’m not suggesting we all put on buckled hats and eat with wooden spoons. But perhaps we could recover three small things the Pilgrims never forgot:
- Gratitude is relational. It’s a conversation, not a monologue. Speak it to Someone who can hear.
- Survival is not the baseline. It’s a wonder. Treat it that way at least once a year.
- Feasting and worship belong together. Joyful eating has always been part of thankful worship. Keep the turkey, just remember why it’s there.
My grandmother is gone now, but every year I still make everyone go around the table before we eat. Some years it’s still awkward. Some years someone rolls their eyes. But every year, for one brief moment, we remember that the food isn’t the point.
The point is the Giver.
And maybe, if we can remember that, Thanksgiving can be something more than a forgotten holy day.
Maybe it can be holy again.
