By NiallO’Dowd

Thanksgiving is that most perfect of holidays that does not single out any religion or race, but merely offers itself as a day of acknowledgement of all the bounty we enjoy in America.

It will bring together the 130 nationalities who live in New York, for instance, on the one day in the year when atheist, Protestant, Jew, Muslim and Catholic can all enjoy the benefits of the special occasion with no one religion being singled out.

There is much to be thankful in the holiday itself. There is none of the madness of Christmas, of frantic gift buying and consumerism, of ensuring that every base is covered. It is the calm before the Christmas storm, yet a day that rivals Christmas because of its simplicity and straightforward message.

There is much to be thankful for. We have come another year without any destructive act of terrorism on our shores, making it over five years since that dreaded day of September 11.

We would have been more than happy to accept that in the aftermath of that dire day. Of course, now there is death and destruction in Iraq on a grand scale, with tens of thousands of Iraqis and thousands of Americans dead.

Yet there is a glimmer of hope this Thanksgiving that our American troops will soon begin winding down their mission and coming back home.

For the hundreds of thousands of anxious parents anxiously waiting for that day, this Thanksgiving cannot pass soon enough, and the dream of being reunited by next year’s is undoubtedly strong. Let us hope they achieve their wish.

For our younger Irish emigrants there is the hope this Thanksgiving that their undocumented status will finally be addressed in the new session of Congress.

We should give thanks to politicians such as Senators John McCain and Edward Kennedy for their unstinting work on behalf of a fair and reasonable solution to the undocumented immigration problem. Without them we would not have passed a bill through the Senate, without them we will not have comprehensive reform in the year ahead.

Thanks also to the peacemakers in Northern Ireland who have come so far this year, to the point where at Thanksgiving we are looking at the final lap towards a devolved power sharing government which will make the Troubles merely a bad memory.

Nowadays Northern Ireland has become somewhat passé as the media carnival has moved on. But the achievements there, ground out inch by inch over the past 15 years or so, have been extraordinary.

We need to give special thanks to men like British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who will be gone by next Thanksgiving, for the extraordinary effort he has put into solving the perennial Irish/British problem. Bertie Ahern, his counterpart in the Irish Republic, and the party leaders in the North also deserve thanks and praise for sticking at a thankless task through thick and thin.

Perhaps it is so remarkable this Thanksgiving that the thought of a final peace in Ireland is such a ho-hum notion. The long years of negotiation have dulled the appetites for confrontation, something we can all give thanks for.

Finally, thanks to the young members of the Irish American community who became so political this year by showing up in their thousands to lobby for themselves in Washington, D.C. for immigration reform. You showed once again how wonderful the Irish character and determination can be.

The Irish community here in the U.S., looking at a bleak future without you, owes all you thanks above everything else.