Thanksgiving

The other day I received a mass email greeting from the president of the university where I direct a campus ministry.  It was a Thanksgiving greeting.  In it the president thanked the recipients for their “friendship and support” of the university.

That’s nice.  It is good to thank those who have done things for us, or for groups or causes of which we are a part.  But it impoverishes and even bastardizes the American tradition of Thanksgiving.

The point of the day is to focus on expressing thanks to God.  I know university presidents probably cannot officially endorse that today.  But it might be better, if you cannot participate officially in the spirit of Thanksgiving, to just ignore it and let it pass.

In fact, there is very little reason to thank other people for things if there is no God.  If God does not exist, then all things are morally permissible, including ingratitude to other people.  Why are other people important at all, except for your own purposes, if there is no Creator to Whom we owe thanks?

One of the tragic and ironic things about modern higher education is the attempt to pursue learning in an atmosphere of pretended religious neutrality.  In the end, everything is “religious.”  Until we understand that, we will understand nothing.