Who Belongs at the Thanksgiving Table?

Immigration, Religion, and the Four-Hundredth Anniversary of the First Thanksgiving

Wednesday, November 17, 2021
12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. EST
Location: Online Zoom Webinar

The four-hundredth anniversaries of the Mayflower landing and the first Thanksgiving in Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 2020 and 2021 set the stage for a conversation about national identity at a moment of deep polarization and insecurity. The wake left by the Mayflower is still felt, particularly by Indigenous communities impacted by the loss of land and by African Americans whose ancestors’ subjugation was intertwined with European liberty. Centuries of immigrants who felt excluded because they did not descend from Pilgrim or Puritan stock have also experienced this wake. In the American church, polarized histories cut between and through denominations, exacerbating the intra-Christian “culture war.” Scripture and theology have been used for cross purposes to either welcome or keep out the immigrant.

Building upon on a recent special issue of the Review of Faith & International Affairs on this topic, this webinar provided the opportunity for a candid and constructive conversation among professional historians on the contested legacy of the “first Thanksgiving” of 1621. In a polarized climate where history is so often weaponized, this panel was designed to model deep appreciation for the past combined with constructive self-critique, as well as insight on the implications for contemporary issues of national identity, pluralism, civic solidarity, and immigration. Judd Birdsall moderated the event.

This event was co-sponsored by Georgetown University's Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs and its Department of History.

Disclaimer: Images like the painting above invoke history to shape national identity, but in the process they can misrepresent or distort historical persons and events.

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Painting of the "First Thanksgiving" in 1621.

Participants

Christine Arnold-Lourie Toggle

About Christine Arnold-Lourie

Dr. Christine Arnold-Lourie is a professor of history and chair of humanities and social sciences at the College of Southern Maryland. Her research includes United States history, women in Europe, the American experience, and the history of race and racism. She is co-author of Pathways to History: Charles County, Maryland (2008).

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Margaret Bendroth Toggle

About Margaret Bendroth

Dr. Margaret (Peggy) Bendroth is a historian of American religion and former executive director of the Congregational Library and Archives. Her work focuses on American religious history, especially fundamentalists and modern liberal Protestants; urban religion; and women and gender. Her credited works include Fundamentalism and Gender, 1875 to the Present (1993).

Margaret Bendroth's Profile

Judd Birdsall Toggle

About Judd Birdsall

Judd Birdsall is assistant professor of the practice in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Georgetown University, where he is also a senior fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs and the project director of the Transatlantic Policy Network on Religion and Diplomacy (TPNRD). In addition, he is a senior advisor on the religion and inclusive societies team at the United States Institute of Peace. From 2011 to 2020 Birdsall was based at Cambridge University, where he earned his Ph.D., founded a research center on religion and international studies, and served as an affiliated lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Studies. Prior to his time at Cambridge, he served in the U.S. State Department’s Office of International Religious Freedom and on the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning Staff. Birdsall is the editor of Religion & Diplomacy, and his work has appeared in the Washington Post, Foreign Policy, Guardian, Huffington Post, Christianity Today, and Religion & Politics. He is also a senior editor and a frequent contributor at the Review of Faith & International Affairs.

Judd Birdsall's Profile

Matthew Rowley Toggle

About Matthew Rowley

Dr. Matthew Rowley is an honorary fellow in the history department at the University of Leicester. His interests include studying toxic and intoxicating mixtures of piety and politics, and his research focuses on applying historical and theological analysis to issues of violence and conflict. Rowley is author of Trump and the Protestant Reaction to Make America Great Again (2020).

Matthew Rowley's Profile