Share Your Thanksgiving Stories

My wife and I have been doing our own Thanksgiving since 2005. She’s totally cool with my non-faith (she’d have to be or I wouldn’t have married her) so there’s no real religious tension.

For larger family gatherings, I figure I’ll remain in the closet until we have kids and they out me by mistake. Fortunately for me, at least for the moment, faith in my family tends to be enough of a secondary, or perhaps “taken for granted” issue that it rarely comes up explicitly.

Of course, when my dad remarried, he married a unitarian. Unless he’s a total hypocrite I imagine he would be fine with it. My sister knows too, but she’s agnostic. I’m more concerned about my mom and brother, not to mention my entire mom’s side of the family.

I was told I was too young to have and opinion

I’m 27 and my mom still tells me this since I came out as a Democrat.

In my family there was never anything particularly religious about Thanksgiving — which was a month ago here in Canada — so that was never an issue. In general, however, special family dinners have been a bit of a pain.

When I was little, I remember my family praying before every meal. Sometime in my teens or tweens, that stopped and was reserved for special occasions. I’m not sure what changed, but something tells me that it was simply that I was older, an altar boy and a sacristan, so my religious indoctrination was seemingly complete. By the time I was an atheist, I was living in a different city and not going to Christmas mass was about the only issue. Praying before Christmas dinner was easy to get around as I’d simply bow my head with everyone else as a sign of respect for what they believe.

Then, my brother had a son who is 10 now. Family dinners were held at their place and suddenly religion was on the front burner again. The new way they pray before meals is particularly bothersome for me… everyone sitting around the table joins hands while someone leads the prayer. I hate this because it is forcing me to be an active participant in their prayer as my only other choice is to make a scene. Four years ago when I moved back to the city, for the first year I was asked at every dinner to LEAD the prayer which combined with my constant refusals ended up causing a scene. Now it’s my poor nephew who usually leads the prayer which frustrates me even more.

So it’s strange… for years religion and prayer was never really an issue until a child came along. What is it about children that brings out the urge for religious indoctrination?

I agree with mikespeir.

Family is first, religious differences come second.

I’ve been open with my family since I was young and throughout my wonderings and journey into finding whats right for me. Religion honestly doesn’t come up often. If they decide to have a prayer, its just a bow your head kinda thing. I do that out of respect for my family as they don’t antagonize me out of respect for me. I even go to Christmas mass with my family out of respect for them. Its a big event to them. But i of course don’t take communion and they’re ok with that.

So today, i’d say that I’m thankful to and for my family for putting whats most important first, family and relationships.

Well today I finally revealed to my parents and my mother’s side of the family my atheism, although unfortunately not on my terms.

I’ve been an atheist for two and a half years now, but both sides of my family are very religious, especially my fathers side who spent their lives building and pastoring assembly of god churches. I guess that is why I’ve decided to keep it from them all this time.

It started out with my mom talking about ghosts and hauntings, a favorite topic of hers. I laughed it off and teased her about it a bit in good nature, and then we began talking about homeopathy. I guess homeopathy is her new hobby, with my sister and aunt being recent converts. Of course I think its all a load of bull and felt obligated to challenge her method of thinking (respectfully of course) and point out some of the fallacies of homeopathy, etc. We went back and forth for a little while and overall it was very good-natured, but my aunt stepped in and asked me if I believed in any spiritual world. I said no, and then she dropped the big question; “do you believe in god?”

I said no, and they seemed shocked. I felt like I was backed into a corner in a way but I wasnt going to cheapen my beliefs by hiding them under direct questioning. Later on they joked around with me about it, which I guess means they either want to let me know it doesnt bother them, or they aren’t taking it seriously. Either way I realized it does not matter to me. These are my beliefs and I am not ashamed of them.

I was very happy to host my family’s Thanksgiving for the first time today — the farthest we go at the religious end of the spectrum are a few people who consider themselves “spiritual” and subscribe to a kind of hybrid Buddhist/Christian philosophy; the rest of us are atheists. It was a wonderful day and we were all very grateful for what we have, most of all -each other.-

Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow godless heathens. 😉

I read that thanksgiving was first celebrated by the pilgrims who would have been starving if it wasn’t for the wampanoag. Everybody should be thankful to the wampanoag who taught the pilgrims agriculture…I dont really understand people who thank god all the time for the good things and damn men for the bad ones

This is the first year that my family stayed home to have our own Thanksgiving meal. I am atheist and my wife is not. Our kids are just kids, no religion, no atheism. It was a very nice meal. No religion, just our family being thankful for everyone and everything that we have.

After we had our meal we went to her sisters house to visit. That is where the rest of the family gathered to have Thanksgiving. Her family is VERY religious, her father is a preacher at a small local church. Her mom is a big part of the church and now her sister has gotten heavy into the church, and sends her kids to a Christian school.
It always surprises me and makes me a little uncomfortable when we go to their homes, because even with all their religion, they always seem to start to make disparaging remarks about other nationalities, gay and lesbian people, and any other people that are not exactly like them. They tend to be the most intolerant, racist people that I know. It made our decision to eat our meal on our own that much easier. I hope this is a tradition in the making.

My family had relatives over for Thanksgiving. I’d let my parents know a few weeks ago that I’ve been going to a Unitarian church, but we hadn’t actually discussed it yet. Thankfully they waited until after the relatives left to try to ambush me*. They’re fervently religious, but politically moderate-to-left-leaning, so it went okay. It helps that Unitarian-Universalism grew out of Christianity, and that there are numerous belief systems that gather into UU communities. I didn’t tear the whole veil away yet, but at least I took baby steps. Baby steps forward are still steps forward.

*I say ‘ambush’ but a) I expected and was prepared for it, and b) they weren’t accusatory or confrontational. I take it as a good sign that they decided not to let the extended family back me into a corner.

This year’s Thanksgiving was barren of any religious taints at my parents place. Well, at least as far as I know. My fiance and I delayed ourselves a bit just in case there was a saying of grace before the meal. He’s a fervent atheist, and I’m a casual Buddhist with strong atheistic leanings.

There was one year in which my grandfather on my step-mother’s side (who are all devout Catholics) decided to be an instigator and try to get me to say grace. I refused, and so he felt the need to call on me to say grace for any subsequent meal at their home after that. It caused quite the bit of distress in the family. and I intentionally stopped visiting when he was home (there were other reasons as well).

My family has taken my beliefs and that of my soon-to-be husband with great stride. Although there are times where they make outright attacks on us. Such as one year my parents gave me a Tibetan Silk prayer scroll for Christmas, but later that day at dinner told me that I needed to let god more into my life. Oh well. Maybe one day they will understand :-).

Peace to you all!

My mother-in-law jokingly asked if I wanted to say grace. I replied that I wasn’t exactly a “god person,” and she said that I was surrounded by nine others.

As my husband put it today, for all the annoyance that my in-laws heap upon me, at least the whole crew is atheist/agnostic.

We had a very nice, entirely secular, celebration.

My mother, 94, doesn’t like big family gatherings anymore –too many people, too much noise. And, frankly, my husband and I aren’t all that interested either. I used to roast a turkey and make dinner at our house after I arrived home from work on Wednesday night (actually Thursday morning) around 2 a.m., then pack it all up, ready to take it to her house. (She lives an hour away, so if we went to pick her up and bring her home, then take her back, we would be driving 4 hours —so we’ve done this for years.) Usually, before dinner, my mother would bow her head, close her eyes and say a prayer outloud. We just sat quietly until she finished. Sometimes, in more recent years, she would forget.

But, my mother hardly ate anything. So it seemed to be so much work for nothing. So my husband and I looked for an open restuarant —-we found only one.

Yesterday, my mother didn’t pray at Denny’s.

I have come out of the atheist closet with most of my friends, but I’ve never discussed it with relatives. I figure no use upsetting my mother at age 94. I will probably completely leave the closet after my mother dies.

My mom knows my wife and I are atheists and my dad’s side knows. They’re fine with it. I doubt my mom’s side knows. I don’t know. I doubt my mom told them. We haven’t gotten together with them since grandpa passed away, but when we did get together my wife and I would just sit quietly, head unbowed and hands below the table while everyone else said grace. I wouldn’t hide it from them. If the question were posed I would admit my non-belief, especially now that grandpa’s gone. The same goes for my wife’s side. Her dad’s side knows and is cool. On her mom’s side we just keep it quiet unless asked.

This year we didn’t get together with either side. We opted to stay in town and volunteer delivering free meals around town. We cooked a mini Thanksgiving for her folks and brother last night.