Thanksgiving

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Thanksgiving. Where did it go? I mean, the candy from Halloween hasn't even been loosed from its wrapper before I am bombarded with e-mails, T.V. commercials, radio ads, billboards, events, and all manner of media promoting Christmas. Is Thanksgiving the Rodney Dangerfield of holidays? I have grown increasingly annoyed at this apathetic treatment of the holiday (and frankly I am surprised that some right-winged organization hasn't made a big deal about the snubbing of a potentially patriotic holiday). I think the grand commercial shuffle that Christmas has become has a lot to do with the displacement of Thanksgiving; maybe we should move the holiday after Christmas, then there'd be no rush to get up early the next morning, leave your family for the whole day just to buy a trunk load of junk that others will wind up donating to charity anyway! I don't know...I'm just saying.

I think I'm most annoyed though with the way that the erasing of Thanksgiving has led to the absence of true thankfulness and, in return, genuine charity (the Greek agape). If we ignore Thanksgiving, only pausing to acknowledge it as the signpost that brings in the "shopping" season, we fail to really see how UNBELIEVABLY fortunate we are. Now, I don't begrudge anyone a nice, warm family get-together, with football, turkey, and can-shaped cranberry sauce, but what about those who actually have to stand in line at a shelter for food? You'd better believe those people don't overlook Thanksgiving! After all, that's when the rest of us cash in our good deed for the year, get dressed down, and go serve "those less fortunate" just to go back home to eat all those leftovers.

CPT

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