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Social critique was no stranger to our pre-feast ritual, alongside our heartfelt prayers of gratitude for family, friends, and food. But when one of the “kids,” now in his early 20s, read this Native People’s ode to interconnectedness and interdependence among the Creator, the earth, and human beings, I was uncomfortable. Couldn’t we just thank God and be done with it? Wasn’t it silly to thank “things,” like trees, the wind, and the stars?
Today I am humbled and embarrassed by my ignorance of the wisdom of Indigenous faith and culture. Thanks to teachers like Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, whose voices have been amplified by the steady drumbeat of one climate change disaster after the other, I am just beginning to understand the intended and unintended consequences of abstract gratitude.
One does not have to adhere to prosperity theology to believe that God will provide. But petitioning and thanking God is not the same thing as recognizing how much we depend on what is already here. God’s blessings flow into a world renewed by cycles and seasons, a world in which everything receives and gives, and everything has a purpose. Humankind is created last, not to disrupt or corrupt what is already there but to enjoy it and to care for it. The story of Noah is a cautionary tale about what happens when we emphasize the former at the expense of the latter.
Humans easily forget that we are only one part of creation, and that our very lives depend on the thriving of it all—other people, the earth, the waters, the fish, the plants, the animals, the trees, the birds, the wind, the sun, the moon, the stars. The Haudenosaunee Address reminds us that none of these things are separate from us, or any less alive. Naming and greeting each of them is a concrete alternative to abstract acknowledgement, making it more difficult to maintain the distance and separateness that leads to hubris and entitlement.
The way most Americans celebrate Thanksgiving reflects a culture that does not view our world as interdependent. Most of us give thanks for what we have, and many donate time, talent or treasure to reflect our gratitude. But, for the most part, this holiday has become all about food, family, and football.
As we prepare for this Thanksgiving, with a global pandemic still shaping our daily lives and on the heels of the largest U.N. Climate Summit in history, more is demanded of us. People argue about specifics, but do not disagree about the need to better care for and protect one another and our planet, or the suffering and loss that occurs because some horde and waste resources that others have no access to. Can we truly show gratitude if we ignore these issues or treat them as abstract concerns?
Consider a parent who gives a child a car to replace the one whose engine burnt out because that child ignored the oil leak. The child may say “thank you,” but those words ring hollow unless they maintain the new car in addition to driving it.
I will be reading the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving address before our Thanksgiving feast this year. For me it has been transformed from something strange into, as Valarie Kaur says, “a part of me I did not yet know.” It is time to articulate specifically what I am grateful for, and to show my gratitude through acknowledging and caring for all that I depend on.
As my dear friend and teacher, Rev. Dr. William McElvaney used to say, “We all live in assisted living.” May you be blessed with a meaningful and joyous Thanksgiving, knowing you are held by infinite sources of sustenance and love.
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