What IS "Thanksgiving"? I'm going to go literal to answer this.
Thanksgiving is when we thank our Creator for our very lives. The schools used to teach this, but don't nowadays, they've turned the observance into some sort of a multi-culti object lesson .
The observances originally were held as a matter of local course by early colonists on these shores, but President George Washington made it an official observance:
"This historic proclamation was issued by George Washington during his first year as President. It sets aside Thursday, November 26 as "A Day of Publick Thanksgiving and Prayer."
While there were Thanksgiving observances in America both before and after Washington's proclamation, this represents the first to be so designated by the new national government.Signed by Washington on October 3, 1789 and entitled "General Thanksgiving," the decree appointed the day "to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God"." (citation here) .
Note the words titling the Proclamation (an early type of Exedutive Order): "Publick Thanksgiving and Prayer".
Thanksgiving is all about Piety and Prayer, and it is a day where we think, feel and express our personal piety and thank God for the Gifts He has bestowed on us recently.
Please hear my Prayer of Thanks:
I thank my Lord God for several things, but the first of them is that He gave up his only Son, Jesus, to lead us out of our Sin. (John 3:16)
I thank my Lord God for my very life, and the fact that He has seen fit, at my age of 76, that I continue it.
I thank my Lord God for the life of my dear wife Blanche, who He is having to fight VERY hard for at the moment.
I thank my Lord God for the lives and health of my children and my grand-children.
Finally, I thank my Lord God that He has held my Nation and society together in these parlous times, and thereby saved me from expending MY life to save The Union, as I am sworn to do.
YOU have done these things for ME, my Lord God, and I have the hubris to believe that YOU did them because YOU and Jesus love me.
Amen, my Lord.
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