Dear reader,
Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers! To my non-American readers, I hope you will forgive a letter inspired by that very American holiday, Thanksgiving. Tonight we are celebrating with fellow Americans-in-Melbourne, and I am eagerly anticipating the feast and good company!
I peeked back at my letter from last November, a reflection on the attentiveness needed to cultivate gratitude. Here, a year later, I’m not sure that I have progressed very far in giving thanks. A different sort of problem is on my mind, though, than one of attentiveness. Instead, I’m thinking about the complexity of giving thanks as suffering people in a suffering world.
Recent public attention to injustice and suffering has led to quite a bit of commentary about the ineptitude of Evangelical Christians to lament. From worship songs to glib responses about God’s sovereignty, Christians whose faith has been nurtured in prosperity tend towards a triumphalist approach to the world. Victory and resurrection dominate language about the Christian life. Mourning—whether over our own sin or its devastation of others—doesn’t make a significant appearance.
In light of this indiscriminate celebration that wants to erase the pain we and others experience (to put it very strongly!), I find that I have engaged in a strange kind of resistance: not giving thanks. By nature an idealist, I keenly sense when things fall short of perfection. I can feel as if offering thanks is a betrayal of honesty, of a willingness to see the evil and round me and in me. We cannot change, I firmly believe, if we cannot accurately name what is wrong. And so, I find my gratitude held back in a distorted way by my desire not to ignore reality.
But the Scriptures insist that I ought to give thanks. Paul admonishes us to give thanks in all circumstances, and James exhorts us to be joyful when we face suffering. The posture of gratitude ought to be primary, and yet I am trying to find a way to give thanks that does not minimize what is wrong.
In the newest season of Disney’s TV production of The Mysterious Benedict Society, villain L.D. Curtain has tapped into neuroscience and hypnosis in order to create an artificial sense of happiness in his devotees. He instructs them to “Choose happiness,” and to “opt in to joy and good feeling.” I wonder, how does this differ from the apostles Paul and James’ instructions? Isn’t the posture of gratitude a pair of rose-coloured glasses that obscures the true reality of things?
Two answers come to mind: first, from the psalmist king, David, and second—another David—a modern-day philosopher and theologian. King David was no stranger to suffering and evil, both that which he faced from his enemies, and that which was produced by his own rapacious heart. Four of the first six psalms of the Psalter express this, speaking honestly about his trouble. And yet each one also contains, in some way, expressions of gratitude: declarations about the goodness of the Lord, his faithfulness to his people, his strength to save.
David’s gratitude does not obscure the reality of his circumstances, but it reorients his heart. Oriented towards God, David is enabled to name what is wrong more truly—and to name that wrong’s limited scope. It will not have the last word, but will be overcome by God’s victory in Jesus. This deserves our thanksgiving!
The second David is David Bentley Hart, who in his book Beauty of the Infinite argues against the pessimistic modern and postmodern worldviews. Instead, he insists that Christianity tells the story of our world being created out of the infinite, overflowing love of the Triune God. Beginning from such beatitude, the world is most fundamentally a gift, an existence of peace.
This means that any sin or suffering that we experience is an aberration. It is not what is most true about reality, but exists as a distortion and corruption of the way things are meant to be.
A posture of gratitude, then, that does not dismiss reality, is one that recognises this peace and beatitude as what is most true and what will be finally true. Gratitude declares that there is still good to be named and received, even as we name and resist what is evil.
Unlike L.D. Curtain’s manufactured happiness, the gratitude that Scripture calls us to is able to hold grief and joy together.
Whether you find it easier to receive the good or to resist the evil, may your heart and mouth overflow with thanksgiving, both now and into eternity.
This Norman Rockwell painting, “Freedom from Want” is one of the most famous Thanksgiving-themed paintings. I have always loved the warmth created by the facial expressions and the feast. More recently, though, I read a review of Rockwell, accusing him of sentimentality: ignoring ugliness and creating a false sense of happiness in his paintings. Apparently this is somewhat of a universal opinion held by critics; I am still making up my mind.
I have to sneak in another painting this month, if only because I discovered that the artist of this painting (Catching the Thanksgiving Turkey) is a woman who began her painting career at the age of 78. 78! Grandma Moses is her name, and I find her success at such an age to be extraordinary in the best possible way.
For the past several months I’ve slowly been working my way through Tish Harrison Warren’s latest book, A Prayer in the Night. I appreciate how clearly and yet profoundly she writes about faith and our everyday experiences. I’ve also squeezed in a novel among my stacks of non-fiction: Elizabeth Goudge’s The Scent of Water. I just loved this beautiful, quiet book. The story traces the lives of people in a small English village, and their joys and sorrows drew me in so completely.
Almighty God, Father of all mercies, we thine unworthy servants do give thee most humble and hearty thanks for all thy goodness and loving-kindness to us and to all men. We bless thee for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all for thine inestimable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory. And we beseech thee, give us that due sense of all thy mercies, that our hearts may be unfeignedly thankful, and that we shew forth thy praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives; by giving up ourselves to thy service, and by walking before thee in holiness and righteousness all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom with thee and the Holy Ghost be all honour and glory, world without end. Amen.
- General Thanksgiving from The Book of Common Prayer
On the road with you,
Laura