Thursday, November 22, 2007

Abundance

Look on the web and you’ll find an abundance of versions of the history of Thanksgiving. In the past, we were taught that the Pilgrims celebrated the first Thanksgiving in 1621 in Plymouth, MA with neighboring Native Americans to thank them for helping them (the Pilgrims) survive their first year.

In another version, the first official Thanksgiving was held by English colonists at the Berkeley Plantation in Virginia in 1619 as an annual day of thanksgiving to God.

And now, a new book has come out, "America’s REAL First Thanksgiving" (Robyn Gioia) that says the first Thanksgiving feast was in 1565 near Saint Augustine, FL, and was a celebration shared by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez and the native Timucua people.

While the new historical discoveries of this day are intriguing, I would offer that the main point is for us to take time to give thanks for all we have and for all the ways our families and friends have blessed our lives.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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Sometimes our light goes out, but is blown into flame by another human being. Each of us owes deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this light.
~Albert Schweitzer

I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.
~G.K. Chesterton

I feel a very unusual sensation - if it is not indigestion, I think it must be gratitude.
~Benjamin Disraeli

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