New purposes for old holidays

This column was originally written for Spotlight Online.

Today, November 20, is a German holiday that doesn’t really exist, but that still affects us at Spotlight. Buß- und Bettag (Day of Repentance and Prayer) is a Protestant holiday observed in only two parts of the country: in the state of Saxony and in Bavarian schools. Because our offices are located outside the capital of Bavaria, we have to deal with the strange fact that children here have the day off when their parents don’t. The company has therefore organized a program of activities for the kids. There are so many children here today that one can see the potential of a tradition starting. In coming years, we may celebrate Buß- und Bettag as Children’s Day.

Let’s be honest: very few people celebrate holidays like Buß- und Bettag in the way they were originally intended. This is unavoidable. It is in the nature of holidays and traditions that, over time, their purpose changes or is replaced by another. Christmas is an obvious example. One detail — gift-giving — has displaced the original focus and turned a religious celebration into a secular one.

In the United States, several holidays have gone this way.

Some, of course, have not. New Year’s Day is general enough not to be affected. Martin Luther King Day, first observed in 1986, is too recent an invention to have changed. Independence Day and Veterans’ Day are given proper attention by the government, the citizenry and the military.

I’ve written about the Plymouth colony, which organized the first Thanksgiving. And on Thanksgiving, people do think of the Massachusetts colonists, the Native Americans, and their joint celebration of the harvest in 1621. When massive amounts of food are set in front of them on this day, today’s Americans do take a moment to realize how much they have.

The main focus, though, is on spending the day with one’s extended family. When possible, Americans travel up to thousands of miles to be together on Thanksgiving. Offices close for a long weekend, and universities plan in a break. It’s a worthy purpose, though not the one the originators had in mind.

The true meaning of Thanksgiving

The first Thanksgiving was a real opportunity to turn things in the right direction. Spanish colonization of the Americas, starting with Columbus, had been cruel. The Virginia colony, which the Pilgrims had attempted to sail to, was already starting to import African slaves to farm the only profitable crop the English knew how to grow there: tobacco. The Plymouth colony and its neighbors, however, had no ambition except to survive.

Both the Pilgrims and the native Wampanoag people had suffered great losses. The Pilgrims’ stupidity cost the lives of half their people during the first winter. Earlier traders had spread diseases that had killed a lot of the native population. The 53 surviving Pilgrims, with their superior technology, and the 90 or so Wampanoag, with their superior agriculture and hunting skills, were at parity. The Wampanoag liked the useful, modern objects the Pilgrims brought; the Pilgrims enjoyed not starving. The two groups exchanged goods and ideas and lived side by side — for a while.

There are a number of examples across the country of such symbiosis, with the native population being a major trading partner and a useful source of labor to the colonial economy, and the colonists bringing modern conveniences — horses, weapons, tools — that improved the lives of the Indians. A number of people even intermarried.

Tragically, greed, suspicion and political interference made it impossible for this to continue forever, and the rest of the story is pretty bad. But for a time, peace prevailed in spite of differences.

To me, this is the true message of Thanksgiving — one that applies both to its historical origins and to its modern purpose of reuniting families. Family members may not always see eye to eye, but it is nice to have that one day when everyone comes together.