"Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of
November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service
of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all
the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite
in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks, for His kind care
and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a
Nation, for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable
interpositions of His providence, which we experienced in the course and
conclusion of the late war, for the great degree of tranquility, union,
and plenty, which we have since enjoyed, for the peaceable and rational
manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of
government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national
one now lately instituted, for the civil and religious liberty with
which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing
useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors
which He hath been pleased to confer upon us."
--George Washington, Thanksgiving Proclamation, October 3, 1789
"In the crucified Jesus the divinity is disfigured,
stripped of all visible glory and yet is present and real. Faith alone
can recognize it: the faith of Mary, who places in her heart too this
last scene in the mosaic of her Son's life. She does not yet see the
whole, but continues to trust in God, repeating once again with the same
abandonment: “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord” (cf. Lk 1:38).
"Then there is the faith of the Good Thief: a faith
barely outlined but sufficient to assure him salvation: “Today you will
be with me in Paradise” . This “with me” is crucial. Yes, it is this
that saves him. Of course, the good thief is on the cross like Jesus, but above all he is on the Cross with
Jesus. And, unlike the other evildoer and all those who taunt him, he
does not ask Jesus to come done from the Cross nor to make him come
down. Instead he says: “remember me when you come into your kingdom”.
"The Good Thief sees Jesus on the Cross, disfigured and
unrecognizable and yet he entrusts himself to him as to a king, indeed
as to the King. The good thief believes what was written on the tablet
over Jesus' head: “The King of the Jews”. He believed and entrusted
himself. For this reason he was already, immediately, in the “today” of
God, in Paradise, because Paradise is this: being with Jesus, being with God."
--Pope Benedict XVI, Homily, November 21, 2010
"We are called to follow the example of the Master, who revealed the immensity of
his love on the cross... Indeed, the
persecution of Christians does not only happen through mistreatment and
weapons, but also with words, that is, through lies and ideological
manipulation. Especially when we are oppressed by these evils, both physical
and moral, we are called to bear witness to the truth that saves the world; to
the justice that redeems peoples from oppression; to the hope that shows
everyone the way to peace."
--Pope Leo XIV, Angelus Address, November 16, 2025
"God is the true wisdom that never ages, the authentic wealth that
never corrupts, the happiness to which every man aspires in the depths
of his heart. This truth, that passes through the Wisdom Books and
re-emerges in the New Testament, comes to fulfillment in the existence
and teaching of Jesus. In the perspective of Gospel wisdom, death itself
is the bearer of a healthy teaching because it forces us to look
reality in the face; it pushes us to recognize the transience of that
which appears great and strong in the eyes of the world. In the face of
death every reason for human pride vanishes and instead what seriously
matters comes to the fore. Everything comes to an end, every one of us
is passing through this world. Only God has life in himself; he is life.
Ours is a life of participation, given ab alio, thus a man can
gain eternal life only because of the particular relationship that the
Creator himself has established with him. But God, on seeing man
distancing himself from him, made a further step, he created a new
relation between himself and us, of which today's Second Reading speaks.
He, Christ, 'laid down his life for us' (1 Jn. 3:16)."
--Pope Benedict XVI, Homily, November 3, 2008
