One of the ongoing gags on the old Get Smart TV show was the “cone of silence” descending around a table.
In like manner, a “cone of Thanksgiving” will descend around many of our Thanksgiving tables later this week–at least for me.
Within the cone of Thanksgiving, I can easily (and perhaps thoughtlessly) bask in the sundry ways my life is secure and comfortable compared to most of the world around me. Within my cozy Thanksgiving bubble, all the tragedy and despair around me that doesn’t touch me personally fades away until it is no more than items in “today’s news.”
Our family tradition is sharing round-the-table “What am I thankful for?” after Thanksgiving dinner. I find it easy to answer that question; I have many blessings. But honestly, after several rounds, I find myself offering trite, predictable answers.
In ordinary times, it’s easy for many of us to be thankful. But these are not ordinary times!
This year, cracks are obvious in my cone of Thanksgiving. The world around me is far more dangerous, chaotic and upsetting than in any of my previous 68 Thanksgiving holidays.
- As I write there have been over 257,000 American covid-19 deaths, with now close to 1,000 more every day. It took just over two weeks for the nation to go from eight million cases to nine million on Oct. 30; going from nine to 10 million took only 10 days. From 10 million to 11 million took just under seven days.
- An American president has refused to concede electoral defeat, subverting the normal transition of power on which our democracy is founded.
- Deep fears of hunger and homelessness stalk millions of people in our country. I recently heard a podcast interview of a single Dad who made ends meet supporting several children after losing his job by selling off clothing and furniture; with government safety-nets soon to expire on Dec. 31, he deeply fears the future. He was thankful, however, for the fact they had somehow acquired a dining table, so he and his kids could now all eat together.
My question this Thanksgiving is this: will I continue focus on my privileged life within my “cone of Thanksgiving?” Or will I take the risk to step outside it? Can I open myself to seeing the world around me as bleak as many others see it?
I was musing on these thoughts when an essay first preached as a sermon in Oxford’s university church by C.S. Lewis during WWII came to mind, titled “Learning in War-Time.”
Lewis argues the case for why university students, particularly Christians, should continue their vocation as students, even with a world war raging around them. He makes three significant points that I want to re-apply from “learning in war-time” to “feeling thankful in bleak times,” i.e. when it is hard to feel thankful
1. “If we let ourselves, we shall always be waiting for some distraction or other to end before we can really get down to our work. The only people who achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while the conditions are still unfavorable. Favorable conditions never come.” (CS Lewis, “Learning in War-Time”)
I ask myself:
I am accustomed to “Favorable conditions” for feeling thankful. Could I, as Lewis asks, still “seek it [feeling thankful] while the conditions are still unfavorable?”
The very act of feeling thankful in unfavorable conditions seems to me much more an act of hope, even an act of protest.
For me, I want to spend time this week reflecting on where I find the green shoots of feeling thankful pushing their heads above the snow of unfavorable conditions. (An example: I was recently reminded that our election was a tremendous success, spared the once-feared violent confrontations at polling places or intimidation of voters, and with the highest voter turnout in 120 years in the middle of a pandemic.)
2. “Never, in peace or war, commit your virtue or your happiness to the future. Happy work is best done by the man who takes his long-term plans somewhat lightly and works from moment to moment “as to the Lord.” It is only our daily bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received.” (CS Lewis, “Learning in War-Time”
I ask myself:
How can I step outside my “cone of thanksgiving” (where my own future feels quite secure) and focus on the here and now?
What might I be thankful for if I focused on just today? Or just this week?
3. “War makes death real to us, and that would have been regarded as one of its blessings by most of the great Christians of the past. They thought it good for us to be always aware of our mortality. I am inclined to think they were right. All the animal life in us, all schemes of happiness that centered in this world, were always doomed to final frustration. In ordinary times only a wise man can realize it. Now the stupidest of us knows.” (CS Lewis, “Learning in War-Time”
I ask myself:
Can I be more aware of my own mortality as I try to imagine over 250,000 people dying (for many of them) alone without their loved ones?
In ordinary times [Lewis says] only wise people realize “all schemes of happiness centered in this world are doomed to final frustration.”
But these are not ordinary times.
What God might want to teach each of us in these far from ordinary times? Might we even feel thankful for it?
Happy Thanksgiving.
