Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses. –Proverbs 10:12

When I was a youth, some of my best memories of growing up in a household that was deeply rooted in multiple ethnic traditions, were holidays set apart to celebrate those rich heritages. St. Patrick’s Day always belonged to my Irish grandmother, who couldn’t imagine the day passing without corned beef, cabbage, beer and Irish coffee. My normally-stoic German grandparents appreciated the annual New York City VonSteuben day parade replete with brats and sauerkraut, sauerbraten and red cabbage. My mom’s father brought Italian ancestry to our family, and though my grandfather Joseph had a deep appreciation for St. Joseph’s Day, Columbus Day was the day our Sons of Italy groups made it en masse to New York City for the Columbus Day parade with music, games, everything-kind-of-parmigiana, and zeppoli!

Since the 2016 Churchwide Assembly of our Evangelical Lutheran Church in America passed a resolution on the Repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery which calls for the church to “explicitly and clearly repudiate” the doctrine and “to acknowledge and repent of its complicity in the evils of colonialism in the Americas,” Columbus Day has lost its luster. Not only has it made me reconsider my Columbus Day revelry, but just about everything I was ever taught – at home and at school – about how Columbus “discovered” the Americas in 1492. Add to that familial emotional baggage that I married into a family that is very proud of its Mayflower descendants, the Repudiation resolution has shaped much of my “holiday thinking” these last few years.

From the text of the resolution: [We] repudiate explicitly and clearly the European-derived doctrine of discovery as an example of the “improper mixing of the power of the church and the power of the sword” (Augsburg Confession, Article XXVIII), and to acknowledge and repent from this church’s complicity in the evils of colonialism in the Americas, which continue to harm tribal governments and individual tribal members.

There has been a move in recent years to recognize the Columbus Day holiday instead as Indigenous Persons’ Day. The howling on social media at such a suggestion was loud and long. It is an affront to Italian-Americans; it’s “fake history;” Political correctness gone wild … I was more surprised by the response than I expected to be. The Columbus Day holiday has steadily lost observance on state calendars and it was never an especially important holiday to most people. Still the thought of acknowledging that the day better belongs to those who were unfairly and often brutally colonized was anathema to many, at least in my Facebook feed, the Indians have Thanksgiving, isn’t that enough?

Recently, our Synod Council read Canoeing the Mountains: Christian Leadership in Uncharted Territory by Tod Bolsinger. While I appreciated the takeaways from the book and the rich conversations that came out of our Synod Council, the Repudiation resolution really made we wonder if the whole premise of the book was so flawed that even though the conversations were helpful, that perhaps we are not doing the work of implementing the resolution, even after we took the victory lap after its passage.

In the March 2017 edition of the Journal of Lutheran Ethics, Vance Blackfox writes: “Will the task of repudiation put before the church at present be taken as seriously? Or will it be – not unlike the countless gestures that churches, schools, corporations, cities, states, and even countries have made to Native peoples in the past – all apology and no action? They happen. They are meaningful. There may even be a ceremony performed or a letter written, but then there is … nothing. The good feeling subsides, and the work goes with it.”

Again, from the Resolution: To affirm that this church will eliminate the doctrine of discovery from its contemporary rhetoric and programs, electing to practice accompaniment with native peoples instead of a missionary endeavor to them, allowing these partnerships to mutually enrich indigenous communities and the ministries of the ELCA.

I’m not advocating throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and I’m not diminishing the “pilgrim’s pride,” or anyone else’s for that matter. I am suggesting that for the Repudiation resolution to have made any difference in the life of the church, it calls for us to question our cultural underlying assumptions about “the Indians,” how America was “discovered” and how we are complicit in the ongoing effects of colonization when we push back on the conversation about the legitimacy of Indigenous Persons’ Day.

As for me, though proud of my Italian heritage, Columbus Day will never be the same again; nor should it be.

Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses.
The wage of the righteous leads to life, the gain of the wicked to sin.
Whoever heeds instruction is on the path to life, but he who rejects reproof leads others astray. –Proverbs 10:12, 16-17