But first a note from Robert Royal: Today is a day specially set aside for giving thanks. And all of us at TCT - Dominic Cassella, Brad Miner, Karen Popp, Hannah Russo, and myself - thank each of you personally for being readers and supporters of our work. It's such a joyful time that we bring you two reflections on the day - Stephen White about feasting properly in spite of everything, and Michael Foley, in a lighter but still important vein, about being worthy of using other living things for our food. Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving!

Now for today's columns.

Feasting at the End of the World

By Stephen P. White...

There is something fitting about the date of Thanksgiving. I don't mean that there's anything particularly special about the fourth Thursday of November except that it invariably falls in the last week of Ordinary Time. And so our secular holiday corresponds with the close of the liturgical year. This produces an interesting juxtaposition in which a celebration of God's bounty and blessings is set amidst a liturgical barrage of readings about the end of the world.

Take, for example, the readings for today: Thursday of the 34th week in Ordinary Time. In the first reading, we see men break into Daniel's home, denounce him before the king, and have him thrown to the lions. We know the story ends happily for Daniel, but not for his accusers or their wives or their children. "Before they reached the bottom of the den, the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones."

The Gospel for the day is taken from Luke, and it's apocalyptic from start to finish. "Jesus said to his disciples: 'When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, know that its desolation is at hand.'" and it gets worse from there: Woe to pregnant women, people falling by the edge of the sword, being trampled underfoot, or dying of fright.

The Lord promises to return in glory and exhorts the faithful to stand erect, but the whole scene sounds awful, and one gets the distinct sense that Jesus fully intends for it to sound awful. When the Son of God warns of "terrible calamity," and "wrathful judgment," and "nations in dismay," it is prudent to take him seriously.

In the United States, of course, we generally hear the readings for Thanksgiving Day, not for Thursday of the 34th week in Ordinary Time, and these readings are much less likely to sour one's stomach before the turkey is even in the oven. The readings for Thanksgiving Day are all about gratitude for God's blessings.

We hear from the Book of Sirach how the Lord tends the child even in the womb, and of joy and peace and the Lord's enduring goodness. We hear from Paul's first letter to the Corinthians how God pours out his grace and every spiritual gift. In the Gospel (also from Luke), Jesus heals ten lepers and the Samaritan alone among them returns to give thanks: "Stand up and go; your faith has saved you."

No lions; no crushed bones; no terrible calamity or wrathful judgment. Just grace, healing, and glory to God for blessings bestowed.



This juxtaposition between these two sets of readings, the wide variance in tone, might seem jarring, even contradictory. But we Christians know that the futility of this world, which is passing away - both in the transience and material corruption we experience every day of our short lives, and in the tumultuous, terrible, no doubt awesome end to come - in no way negates the goodness of this world or of this present life.

These are extraordinary gifts, given to us by a loving God, for our use and enjoyment. He made this world for us, and He made us capable of enjoying it.

Of course, being a stiff-necked, ungrateful race, we tend to make a hash of these gifts. We worship the gift to the exclusion of the Giver. We lose sight of the proper end for which all these wonderful means are intended. We hoard and waste His gifts, both of which are species of ingratitude.

We even, some of us, teach ourselves to despise His gifts in a misguided attempt to compensate for ...