Plymouth – Americans think they know a lot about the first Thanksgiving, with many envisioning it as happy Pilgrims wearing big buckles and feasting on huge, fat turkeys. But the facts are actually more fascinating than fiction.

Take Plymouth Rock, for instance. Most accept that the big boulder marked “1620” and sitting just feet away from the water is where the Pilgrims first landed in the area. But the Pilgrims themselves never mentioned stepping off their boat onto a rock.

And the person who swore there was a rock and pointed it out to fellow Plymouth residents didn’t bring it up until he was in his 90s, claiming some of the original Pilgrims told him about it.

Thankful Despite Tragedy

As for verifiable facts, one for sure is that these religious reformers started building their first American settlement in the harsh winter of 1620-1621, even as half their number died around them.

But just a few months later, these faithful Christians who believed in thanking God for everything were already planning the first American Thanksgiving.

“This was in 1621 after the first season here in Plymouth where they lost half their population and only had 51 of 102 people left at the end of that season,” Pilgrim role-player Leo Martin told CBN News.

Martin and his wife Nancy not only run the faith-based Jenney Museum in Plymouth but dress up as Pilgrims and give tours and lectures. Martin has also authored the book Pilgrim Pursuit of Happiness.

Martin said the survivors’ first crop did well and they knew they wouldn’t die of starvation.

“They developed enough food to make it through the next winter, and they thought that they ought to thank God for that,” Martin explained.

At the Plimoth Plantation where that first Pilgrim settlement is faithfully recreated, top researcher Richard Pickering dresses up to act out the part of Edward Winslow, one of only two Pilgrims to leave a written record of that first Thanksgiving.

Impersonating Winslow, Pickering told CBN News about preparations for the event.

“The very first feast that we had in these parts, our governor sent four men on fowling and in just some small hours, the four men were able to take enough wildfowl to feed our company for a week,” he said. “For we required a special manner of rejoicing, the Lord having sustained us for a year and having brought in such a goodly harvest.”

‘They Are a Toothsome Bird’

In Plymouth’s annual Thanksgiving parade, the occasional float will go by showing large, plump turkeys, the kind today’s Americans imagine Pilgrims feasted on. But in truth, their turkeys were wild, lean, and mean.

“They were very skinny and they could run up to 25 miles an hour,” Martin said. “So to catch one was a challenge.”

‘Winslow’ said, “I find the turkeys here of New England, they are a bit different than those that live upon the dunghills back home in England. But they are a toothsome bird.”

Another sure fact: these grateful Englishmen didn’t dine alone because they knew they wouldn’t have made it without the Indians, or Sachems, as Winslow called them.

The Native Americans showed them what could grow in this radically different soil that was unkind to English seeds.

Those Pilgrims Could Party

“They felt that Massasoit, the chief of the Wampanoag Indians, was so instrumental in their survival that they should invite Massasoit and his immediate family to that celebration, and they did,” Martin explained.

But Massasoit misunderstood a bit.

“While we were feasting and making of sport and exercising our arms, amongst us come the great Sachem Massasoit and about 90 of his men,” Winslow said.

Martin pointed out that could have wiped out all the Pilgrims’ supplies, but the chief and his braves brought plenty of food with them.

“Venison, turkey, fish, vegetables — and together they had enough food for a three-day celebration where they honored one another and became better friends,” Martin said.

Norah Messier is Plimoth Plantation’s expert on the food of that era.

“Most likely there was fish on the Thanksgiving table as we now refer to it, possibly lobsters. We know when the natives arrived they brought with them venison, something not many of us put on our Thanksgiving table today,” she stated.

‘Pompion Stew’ Instead of Pumpkin Pie

We’d put pumpkin pie on our tables. Messier did a cooking display for CBN News showing what the Pilgrims would have done instead.

“One of the things that most people would say you can’t have Thanksgiving without your pumpkin pie,” Messier said.

“What I’m going to be doing here is exactly what we know they did frequently in New England,” she explained. “The ancient standing dish is called ‘stewed pompion.’ Pompion is the period term for the pumpkin.”

She demonstrated how the Pilgrims would dice this pompion/pumpkin and stew it into sort of a mash.

“Eventually you’re going to add just a splash of vinegar and a little bit of ginger,” Messier said. “And supposedly it’s going to taste like stewed apples, something that was definitely not on the first Thanksgiving table: no apples in New England, not yet.”

They were huge on stuffing, and the batch Messier put together for CBN News came from a recipe dated 1597. It called for breadcrumbs, cranberries, chopped yolk of hard-roasted eggs, butter, and raisins.

Just because of the raisins alone, this stuffing would have taken much more labor.

“Raisins up until recently had seeds in them still,” Messier stated. “Imagine picking out all of those seeds.”

Bringing Old England to New England

Finally, the cook would have seasoned this stuffing with herbs brought all the way from England, like thyme, hyssop, and parsley.

“We believe that the things they are growing in their kitchen gardens in the 17th century are primarily things brought over from England. They’re trying to bring home with them,” Messier explained. “They’re trying to make New England feel like old England.”

That likely is why a man like Winslow would have preferred something better than those skinny, exotic New England turkeys.

Winslow said with a twinkle in his eye, “In truth, my greatest delight is a goose for I do love its great fatness.”
Sources:CBN News

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Western culture — and its roots in Judeo-Christian values — is a phenomenon worth celebrating, according to Welsh actor John Rhys-Davies.

The famed “Lord of the Rings” star recently spoke with CBN News, explaining the Western world ought to be “so proud” of the culture it has created, noting its mooring in Christian principles.

He described the current generations as “the inheritors of one of the most glorious accomplishments that mankind has ever had,” referring to “Western, European, Judeo-Christian civilization.”

“Has it got flaws, yes,” he said. “But let’s not forget it was actually those Christians who said, ‘Slavery is morally wrong and we must get rid of it. … We must extirpate it in the world,’ and they did so. … Our whole democracy comes from those early Christians.”

Speaking of Western styles of government — which, in the U.S., is a constitutional republic — Rhys-Davies credited Christians and deists with establishing the freest form of self-governance in the world.

Early believers, he said, argued, “Surely, what I believe in and my devotion to my God must trump the emperor’s insistence that I worship him.” The actor explained Christians advocated for the “right of individual conscience,” to “associate with people who think the way you think,” the freedom “to express what you think,” and the “right not to be imprisoned for your beliefs.”

Those values, Rhys-Davies said, are the underpinnings of democracy, the “glory of mankind” and “unquestionably the finest way of organizing people in a political and social manner that we’ll ever have.”

While Rhys-Davies doesn’t consider himself a believer, he certainly has an affinity for the faith with which he was raised. It was that, in part, that led him to serve as narrator for a re-released podcast retelling 19th-century novelist Charles Dickens’ classic story, “A Christmas Carol.”

Any actor worth his salt, Rhys-Davies explained, should seize the chance to work on Dickens.

“The opportunity to do Dickens, even if you’ve done different versions of him before, you always grab that,” he said. “Any actor knows that the performance is really controlled by the word — the script — and anytime you get to work with a world-class writer, you should take it — no matter whether you can do it or not; just take it and learn.”

The universal appeal of “A Christmas Carol,” Rhys-Davies said, is its redemptive thread — a fruit of its author’s likely Christian faith.

“We love that idea that, no matter how much we fail, we can change, we can start again,” he said. “There is hope. In the dark of winter, there is hope.”
Sources:faithwire

http://theendtimeradio.com

One vote can make an enormous difference. In Texas, it was a single vote that allowed Biblical material to be included in the local public schools through the state-authored curriculum, Bluebonnet Learning (BL). On Friday, eight of 15 Texas State Board of Education members voted it through. Although it was not free from controversy, last week’s decision means the new curriculum will be available starting in the spring and likely put to use within the 2025 to 2026 school year.

Notably, the Biblical material included in BL is optional. As The Texas Tribune summarized, “The curriculum was designed with a cross-disciplinary approach that uses reading and language arts lessons to advance or cement concepts in other disciplines, such as history and social studies.” Some of the specific Christian references and teachings integrated into BL is Jesus’s parable of “The Good Samaritan,” which can be found in Luke chapter 10, and the “Golden Rule,” found in Matthew 7. The Tribune noted that these parables are “about loving everyone, including your enemies.” The Golden Rule, as stated in the Bible, says, “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them.”

Those who voted against this curriculum included all four Democrats who are on the board, as well as three Republicans. According to The Daily Wire, several Democrats who voted against it felt concerned it would “force Christianity on public school children.” Of those Democrats, Staci Childs verbalized her belief that the curriculum will eventually find itself in court. She told NBC News, “[I]f a parent or a teacher who didn’t feel comfortable teaching this were to bring this up to a court, I believe they would be successful.” Childs also noted that, in her opinion, “these materials are [not] yet reflective of the experiences and the nuance of Texas students.”

Conversely, Republican board member Will Hickman celebrated the future of Texas public schools now that BL has been approved. “In my view,” he said, “these stories are on the education side and are establishing cultural literacy. … [R]eligious concepts like the Good Samaritan and the Golden Rule and Moses [are ones] that all students should be exposed to.” Apart from the board members, it appears parents were also divided on the topic. However, The New York Times reported on one mother’s opinion, in which she stated that the incarnation of Jesus “is and always will be the hinge of all of history.” This mother also posed the question: “How would the canceling of such fundamental facts serve the education of our children or contribute to shape them morally?”

To add to the conversation, Joseph Backholm, Family Research Council’s senior fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement, offered a comment to The Washington Stand. “The classroom will never be values neutral,” he said. “We’ve seen the aggressive way some classrooms have pushed the Sexual Revolution, which is essentially just a different religion. [So,] the fact that the curriculum includes Biblical stories doesn’t mean its teaching Christianity, just that they aren’t pretending there is something dangerous about Biblical stories anymore.”

Backholm agreed that “the history of America is largely Christian. It’s not possible to have a clear understanding of American history without understanding the role faith played in the lives and beliefs of our founders.” According to Backholm, “This is just one of the many ways that Biblical knowledge is [simply] part of a basic education. If you learn American history, you’ll learn about the Bible.”

Ultimately, Backholm believes parents should “be the primary shapers and guardians of children, [but] we don’t want our fear of ‘religious instruction’ to make us afraid of giving a real education. [Because] in the American context, knowing about our history and culture requires knowledge of the Bible.”

FRC’s Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow of Education Studies, also weighed in with TWS. “The folks who are concerned about ‘teaching Christianity’ in classrooms have likely never batted an eye over mindfulness lessons or practice for children, Greek and Roman mythology, and other types of religious content in schools.”

She continued, “Biblical or overtly Christian content is too controversial for use in the classroom when viewed through the ‘lens of inclusivity.'” Agreeing with Backholm, she noted, “There is simply no way to separate America from its expressly Christian foundation, [even] though the educational industrial complex continues to try.” At the end of the day, Kilgannon said she’s “grateful for the Texas school board members who voted to support this measure. We must continue to pray for America’s schools, families, and school children. We must also support local leaders who take a stand for God and country.”

Kilgannon concluded, “Education has always been about state and local control. It’s our duty to pay attention to local matters and make sure our perspectives are heard.”
Sources:BREAKING CHRISTIAN NEWS

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