Thanksgiving Day Reflection

David Martin | The Daily Knight

The first American Thanksgiving was celebrated in St. Augustine, Florida on Sept. 8, 1565, and featured the Mass

Ingratitude is a great evil that robs man of peace and spiritual light. The saints and doctors of the Church teach us that ingratitude is the root and cause of all perdition, the same that brings on wars and chastisements from above. Every sin committed is an act of ingratitude in that we tell God that his friendship doesn’t matter.

Ingratitude for the One True Apostolic Faith is perhaps the worst form of ingratitude. In his mercy, Christ gave us his Church with all its jewels, treasures, and spiritual helps, but since Vatican II we have seen nothing but bickering, mummering, and outright contempt for the gift of tradition that Christ left us. According to St. Malachy and other saints, Rome will be destroyed for this ingratitude.

America Won’t Escape the Scourge

But neither will America escape the scourge. God gave us America and has given us a great president to revive our nation both morally and economically, yet millions throughout our country are listening to the Communist-controlled media that incessantly says, “Hate America, Hate Trump.” For this ingratitude America too will be punished.

One Facebook member vented her lamentation over the unrelenting mockery of many who ungratefully tear away at Trump.

"NEVER, ever in my lifetime have I seen or heard of a President being scrutinized over every word he speaks. He's been hated and humiliated by the public to the point of others wanting to commit violence. He's slandered constantly and ridiculed often. He has been insulted, lied to, lied about, and threatened. People have threatened our beautiful First Lady, and her children have also been insulted and humiliated… I am ashamed of the ruthless, hating, cruel, Trumpfobian people that have no morals and no conscience.... 

"ENOUGH is ENOUGH is ENOUGH! LEAVE THE MAN ALONE AND LET HIM DO HIS JOB! You don't have to like him! However, as an American citizen, you should RESPECT AND SUPPORT his position as our leader. PERIOD. If you can't do that, then maybe you should find another home and stop destroying the land that I love. God Bless America!"

Amen to that! The communist-controlled media is just waiting to catch every word that comes out of Trump's mouth wherewith to hang him, just as the Jews were always waiting to trap Christ in his words. It's called envy. Trump simply wants to rescue and glorify America and to place this country back on its pedestal to shine forth as a Great Nation Under God. This is why they attack him day and night. No one is perfect, just as Trump isn't perfect, but he should be defended. The common consensus is that Washington, Lincoln, Reagan, and Trump have been our greatest presidents, with Trump perhaps being the greatest.   

When people listen to all the media gossip and turn against Trump, they show themselves to be ignorant, unAmerican and ungrateful. Lincoln said that all the problems that came upon America in the civil war (1861-1865) were due to America’s ingratitude, just as the coming civil war is being fueled by ingratitude. God gave America a chance to revive itself through Trump, and instead the people spit in his face. Where is their gratitude?

Return to God or Else                                      

This year's Thanksgiving was an occasion to meditate deeply on how our lack of gratitude is bringing about the fall of America. Unless we as a nation can bring ourselves to our knees and give up our paganistic and promiscuous ways, God will abandon America to the forces of Communism that have thoroughly infiltrated our country. “Wars are a punishment for man’s sins.” (Our Lady at Bayside)

Has America not considered the recent proclamation of Russia and China to back Venezuela’s red aggression against the U.S.? Have Americans considered Russia’s latest move to send troops and advanced military equipment to Venezuela? Has it escaped the attention of we the people that even Iran has joined this alliance against America? Our chastisement is nigh at hand, even at the doors!

The Remedy of Abraham Lincoln

The following is taken from President Lincoln’s Proclamation of March 30, 1863, wherein he lamented America’s ingratitude and emphasized the duty of nations and individuals to acknowledge their dependence on God and confess their sins. 

“We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!”

Lincoln’s words certainly hit home. Never in history was there a nation so noble, so blessed, so  abundantly endowed as this great nation of America. America was truly the Solomon among the nations, a glorious nation dripping with prosperity, a nation that the other countries from afar could look to for guidance, protection and help. Her spirit covered the earth and dispelled the darkness while her people basked in her splendor. At the sight of her radiant majesty, the Soviet beast was forced to remain lurking in the obscurity while America prospered fabulously in the light.

But like Solomon, America grew fat and spoiled and forgot the cause of her bounty. Like Eve, she lent her ears to the red serpent and was seduced by its fake-promises of peace and security to the end that America is now a land of pagans, stripped of her former glory. America the once proud eagle has been plucked by Satan. Intoxicated with unbroken success we too have forgotten God and have failed to recognize the lesson of history that when the morals of a country start to go down into darkness that country will soon be ended.

At the height of the Civil War in 1863 Lincoln proclaimed a National Day of Thanksgiving that we celebrate each November. The Union was being torn asunder as thousands were dying everywhere, yet, at our nation’s darkest hour Lincoln had the courage and good will to call America to give thanks.

Lincoln’s Remedy Must Be Adopted

Lincoln’s plan worked. The war ceased, the slaves were emancipated, and America was set free to continue again as a very prosperous nation. If Lincoln’s plan worked in his time it will certainly work for us today. Lincoln provides us with a clear and failproof remedy as to what our political and religious leaders must do to save our country.

Already Trump is making strides in that direction. The following is taken from his Thanksgiving Day Proclamation of November 27, 2025.

“In 1789, just years after America’s triumph over tyranny in the Revolutionary War, President George Washington established the first National Day of Thanksgiving, declaring “the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.”  Decades later, in the midst of the bloody Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln implored the Nation to join in unity for “a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.” In every generation since, this spirit of reverence, trust, and gratitude has preserved our way of life and made America the strongest, greatest, and most resilient Nation the world has ever known.”

We can only hope and pray that President Trump will follow up by calling for a penitential fast for America’s amendment since admitting our failures and confessing our rebellion against God is what will restore God’s grace and protection to our nation. Because there is no denying that God is withdrawing his grace and protection because of the sins of this nation, especially those of abortion and homosexuality. Let Trump double down on Lincoln’s call for nationwide penance knowing that without extraordinary help from above we will be no match for the forces of Communism that are fast encroaching upon our country.