Come Ye Thankful People

Thanksgiving has come round again. On this side of the pond we think we are reenacting an old morality play, one in which Squanto and Massasoit save the Pilgrims with eels and corn turkey and sweet potatoes, for which the Pilgrims thank them God. There are conflicting opinions about that, but most of us still carry through with the ritual of trying to eat a little something.

Thanksgiving, however, isn't particularly American. It's only our founding myth that sets it somewhat apart (and what good holiday isn't centered on a myth?). Harvest festivals are celebrated at this time of year all over the northern hemisphere. It's likely that those Pilgrims were trying to keep up the old tradition when their local red brothers, who might have celebrated something of the sort themselves before the winter set in, showed up to save their sorry asses starving colony.

Some years later, back in England, the future Dean of Canterbury, Henry Alford, wrote my very favorite Thanksgiving harvest festival hymn. As a stalwart atheist pagan humanist, etc., etc., I will be singing it once again around the house today while baking pies. I do a little creative word substitution here and there.

Now that we have survived the 6th of November, we have so much more to be thankful for this year.

Come, ye thankful people, come,
Raise the song of harvest home!
All is safely gathered in,
Ere the winter storms begin;
God, our Maker, doth provide
For our wants to be supplied;
Come to God's own temple, come;
Raise the song of harvest home!

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