Holidays in the Hoosegow: Thanksgiving with Some Not-So-Just Desserts!

Thanksgiving is a state of mind, not place. Even prisoners can be thankful, if not for being prisoners, then perhaps just for the art of being itself. 

November 12, 2025 by Father Gordon MacRae

I have been hindered from writing a new post this month. This gets a little creepy, so bear with me. On the night of October 31, I was visited in my cell by two brown recluse spiders who were apparently hiding in a shirt that I put on that night because I was cold. Well, so were the spiders and unbeknownst to me they claimed squaters rights to the shirt. Sometime during the night leading to the Solemnity of All Saints, I was bitten twice in the back by two poisonous spiders.

It was a few days before I sought treatment being the stubbornly independent person that I am. Finally the bites evolved into a serious blood infection that now requires all-out war. I now have daily visits to the Medical Unit for wound treatment and new bandaging. I am also on a potent antibiotic. There is some tissue damage. I lost the battle with the spiders, but I am told that I am winning the war thanks to the medical care I am receiving.

The worst part of this whole story was when I told it in a phone call to Pornchai Max Moontri in Thailand, he launched into singing “Itsy, Bitsy Spider.”

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I hope you will read “The True Story of Thanksgiving” posted here every year in late November, this year included. I figure that, in America at least, we eat the same meal every year at Thanksgiving. It is a holiday bound up in traditions. Every year I grimace as the U.S. President pardons a turkey on national television, then gobbles up an already preplucked Butterball in its place for Thanksgiving Dinner. So we added a tradition of our own several years ago, which you will find repeated again this year on the day before Thanksgiving.

Even The Wall Street Journal honors its own Thanksgiving tradition by repeating, on the day before Thanksgiving, the same two editorials at the top of its opinion page. So the message is that repetition is not a bad thing and the story we tell at Thanksgiving is both historically true and spiritually wondrous. Since I first wrote it back in 2010, references to it have appeared in two published history books about the Mayflower Pilgrims. We expect to publish it anew here on Wednesday, November 26.

I hope you will plan to read “The True Story of Thanksgiving: Squanto, the Pilgrims, and the Pope.”

Thanksgiving is a tough sell for most prisoners. It often involves only a litany of losses and discouragement. But I have advocated among other prisoners a more positive approach with some mixed success.

I am not quite ready to give thanks just yet for my 31st Thanksgiving holiday in the hoosegow. But writing this post did make me wonder about the origin of “hoosegow.” The local cable system here carries American Movie Classics (AMC) which broadcasts old westerns on most Saturday mornings. I love John Wayne movies, especially the later ones. It might have been in one of those that I heard Walter Brennan (who, by the way, is from my hometown!) playing a cranky old deputy sheriff.

I can even now hear Walter Brennan threatening to throw someone in the “hoosegow.” Hoosegow has an interesting origin. It comes from the phonetic pronunciation of a Spanish word, “Juzgado,” meaning “courtroom.” It is the past participle of “juzgar,” which in turn came from the Latin “iudicare,” (pronounced, “you-dee-CAR-eh) meaning “judge.” Since judges send people to jail, “juzgado” came to refer to jails and prisons. Then, in the slang of border towns in the American Old West, it became “hoosegow.” So now you know the origin of the word, hoosegow. Don’t thank me just yet!

Here in the hoosegow, like everywhere else in the U.S., we are about to mark Thanksgiving. I would not use “celebrate” to describe how prisoners observe this, or any, holiday. On the whole, prisoners do not really celebrate much. But even here most can find something to be thankful for. I found such a moment several years ago when Pornchai Max and other friends were still here with me. I will even go so far as to say I celebrated it.

The Earth’s journey around our Sun brings about the inevitable changing seasons beyond these stone walls. I have journeyed in life 72 times around our Sun, but most of the fallen citizens around me barely notice the changing world. We venture outside each day among asphalt and steel and high concrete walls with little evidence of the march of time and the changing seasons. The “Field of Dreams” — the prison ball field and the one place with trees in sight — closed for the year two months ago. The only leaves I see now are the very few that the wind carries over the high prison walls which consume my view of the outside world.

One day in autumn some years ago, I turned a corner outside on the long, concrete ramp winding its way up to the prison mess halls. I looked up to discover a spot I never noticed before.

It was a place amid the concrete and steel that afforded a momentary glimpse of a tree-covered hill in the distance beyond the walls, and the rays of the setting sun had fallen upon that very spot. For a moment, the hill was clothed in a blaze of glory with an explosion of fall color. It was magnificent! I felt a bit like Dorothy Gale, stepping for the first time out of the gray gloom of her Kansas home into the startling glory of the Land of Oz.

Prisoners are not permitted to stop and gawk while moving from Point A to Point B, but in two more steps, or a few more seconds, the view would be gone. So I nudged Pornchai and Joseph who were walking with me, and we all stared for a moment in awe. We froze in our tracks for those seconds, risking a guttural shout of “KEEP MOVING!” from one of the guards posted along this via dolorosa.

There was a guard right at that spot, poised to bellow, but then he followed our gaze and he, too, gawked for a moment, keeping his shout to himself. We moved on up the ramp amid all the downcast eyes around us, but saw no evidence that anyone else noticed that scene of radiant beauty beyond these stone walls. I thanked God in silence for nudging me to look up just then. It was proof that a moment for giving thanks presents itself every day, even in this awful place. Those moments will be passed by unnoticed if I am so consumed with grief that I fail to look up and out beyond these stone walls. I have to look up to see. I have to keep my eyes opened, and focus somewhere beyond just me.

I look up at that spot every day now, but the color has faded to a barren gloom, just like life here — or anywhere else — can if I let it. I have learned from Squanto of The Dawn Land that even the worst plight affords an opportunity for thanksgiving. We must not let those moments pass by unnoticed for our very souls depend on them.

I despise this place of captivity where so many of the days given to me have been spent. Really spent! Yet on past Thanksgiving Days, Pornchai, and Joseph, and other friends who walked with us each day, all found a few seats together in the prison chow hall. There we gave thanks for turkey, for an annual piece of pumpkin pie, for friendship found even in the ruins of lives broken and dreams delayed, for laughter in the face of pain, and especially for the gift of bearing one another’s burdens with thanks for the graces given to us.

In a sea of downcast eyes, furtive glances, and foul speech seldom rising above talk of gangs, and drugs, and the exploitation of others, Pornchai showed off his Saint Maximilian medal, and spoke of salvation and sacrifice and the privilege of being Catholic in a truly destitute public square.

In the end, I had been left with no choice and no other prayer to utter: Thank you, Lord, for this day!

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Note from the BTSW Editor: There are simple ways in which you may help magnify this Voice in the Wilderness.

• It helps much to subscribe to Father Gordon’s posts. Note that you will receive an email asking you to confirm your subscription.

• Though we have given up sharing Father Gordon’s posts on Facebook, Pornchai Maximilian Moontri has a Facebook Page in Thailand, which he uses to share our posts in Southeast Asia communities. You may send your “Friend Requests” to Pornchai Maximilian Moontri.

• It would also help Father Gordon substantially if you follow him on X, formerly Twitter.

• Both Father Gordon and Pornchai Moontri have a strong following at LinkedIn.

• And lastly, Father Gordon’s page at gloria.tv is always worth a visit.

John Wayne and Walter Brennan in Rio Bravo.

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Thanksgiving in the Reign of Christ the King

While American tradition offers thanks in the land of the free and the home of the brave, some still await the promise of freedom with a bravery found in defiant hope.

November 20, 2024 by Father Gordon MacRae

Before celebrating Thanksgiving in America — even if you’re not in America — I will be asking the readers of Beyond These Stone Walls to ponder my post for next week. It has become a Thanksgiving tradition at this blog so I will post it anew on the day before Thanksgiving in America. Some readers have said that it has become a part of their own Thanksgiving observance. Its point is clear. Not everyone lives a privileged life. Not everyone even lives a life in freedom. But in the land of the free and the home of the brave, everyone can find reason to give thanks in the Reign of Christ the King.

The story next week’s post will tell is a true account of history that most other sources left in the footnotes. It is also a story that has deep meaning for us who have endured painful losses in this odyssey called life, the loss of loved ones, the loss of health, of happiness, of hope, the unjust loss of freedom. For some, the litany of loss can be long and painful, and it could drive us all into an annual major holiday depression.

It has helped me and those around me to consider the story of Squanto. History is too often passed down by victors alone. The story of the Mayflower Pilgrims who fled religious persecution (though they didn’t really) to endure the wilds of a brave new world (though they didn’t endure it without help) is well known. But it has been stripped of a far more accurate and inspiring story under its surface.

It is the story of Tisquantum, known to history as Squanto, the sole survivor of a place the indigenous called “The Dawn Land,” now known as Plymouth, Massachusetts. Having been chained up and taken on an odyssey of my own, I found very special meaning in the story of Squanto’s quiet but powerful impact on American history. So will you.

If you have followed our posts, then you know that a spirit of Thanksgiving has been elusive for us behind these stone walls. But with a little time and perspective, my friends here and I find that our list of all for which we give thanks has actually grown in size, scope, and clarity.

From the earliest days of BTSW since its inception in 2009, we have tried to live within a single core principle. I first discovered it in the classic book by Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Beacon Press 1992). It promotes a fundamental truth about coping with life’s litany of loss with a central liberating theme: “The one freedom that can never be taken from us is the freedom to choose the person we will be in any circumstance.”

In Frankl’s own words, his story of survival in Auschwitz, the darkest of prisons, was in part inspired by the same person who inspires us. Saint Maximilian Kolbe was a prisoner, but he was first and foremost a Catholic priest who survived heroically by giving his life to save another. “Survived” might seem a strange word to use. Father Maximilian Kolbe was murdered, his earthly remains reduced to smoke and ash to drift in the skies above Auschwitz.

But he survives still. I am certain of this. The Nazi commandant whose power over others extinguished countless lives is now just a footnote on history. I don’t even know his name. But Saint Maximilian lives forever among the communion of saints. He lives in mysterious communion with us behind these stone walls with the same truth that inspired Victor Frankl to survive Auschwitz and write his own story of survival:

“We must never forget that we also find meaning in life even when confronted by a hopeless situation. For what then matters is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential to turn a personal tragedy into a triumph. When we are no longer able to change a situation … we are challenged to change ourselves.”

— Man’s Search for Meaning, p. 116

A friend recently sent me a revision of the famous “Serenity Prayer.” It struck me as an awesome truth and I reposted it a while back in another post, God, Grant Me Serenity. I’ll be Waiting. I find myself sharing this revised version often now with prisoners who come to me with a litany of grief and sorrow:

“God grant me Serenity to accept
the people I cannot change,
The Courage to change
the only one I can,
And the Wisdom to know
that it’s me.”

The Folly of Living with Resentment

One of the two patron saints who empower this blog is Saint Maximilian Kolbe. I have been very much informed by the course of his life in light of his sacrifices. Today my priesthood feels meaningless unless I don the glasses that Father Maximilian wore in prison. If I cannot see what he saw, then what I suffer is meaningless and empty.

But I have seen it. You may recall our post just a week ago, “Thailand’s Once-Lost Son Was Flag Bearer for the Asian Apostolic Congress.” You may have noticed the top graphic on that post. My friend, Pornchai Maximilian Moontri, was wearing a very special shirt sent to him in Thailand by one of our readers. It says “Without sacrifice there is no love.” The quote is attributed to Saint Maximilian Kolbe, and the shirt is emblazoned with his Auschwitz prison number, 16670. I told Max that if he puts this T-shirt on, he will never see his life and suffering the same way again. So I marvel at the fact that he not only put it on, but he wore it for all the world to see.

Sometimes readers write to ask me how it is that I am still (relatively?) sane after 30 years of unjust imprisonment with continually rising and then falling hope. They ask how it is that I still have faith, and why I do not seem to be bitter or resentful when I write. But I HAVE been bitter and resentful about the losses and sorrows life has tossed at me. It is just that I came to recognize that living in anger and resentment is like mixing a toxic brew for our enemies and then drinking it ourselves. It is to live in a self-imposed prison, a relentless assault upon your very soul.

Once you become ready to let go of bitterness and cease to be governed by resentment, faith and hope are what grow in its place. It is like a plant that springs up from a tiny crack in the urban concrete. You simply cannot hold onto your bitterness and your faith at the same time. One of them always gives way to the other.

I find lots of inspiration for this from the readers of this blog. Consider Fr William Graham of the Diocese of Duluth, Minnesota who spent eight years in exile, publicly shamed and his priestly ministry suspended. I wrote of his plight and its most recent development in “After Eight Years in Exile Fr William Graham Is Credibly Innocent.”

He had been falsely accused and cast out in 2016 after his bishop deemed a nearly 40-year-old claim against him to be “credible.” “Credible” is a vague and much abused term used in no other setting but American Catholic priesthood in the age of suspicion. As a legal standard, it means no more than the fact that a priest and an accuser lived in the same geographic area 30, 40, or 50 years ago. If an accusation “could have happened,” then it is seen by our bishops and their lawyers and insurers as “credible.”

After eight years in exile with a dark cloud of accusation hanging over his head, Father Graham was fully exonerated. He returned to ministry in the parish from which he was banished. He returned just in time to file his request for retirement and he moved on to a safer, quieter life with his priesthood intact. In spite of all that befell him, Father Graham believes that he has much to be thankful for. Throughout, Father Graham reported that he found both solace and hope in Beyond These Stone Walls, and it was a lantern during his darker times. Now he is free.

My Thanksgiving for Irony

And I am also thankful for the inspiration of irony. If you have been reading our posts all along, our stories are filled with it. Here’s a very moving example sent to me from a dear reader, the late Kathleen Riney. Kathleen was a retired nurse living in Texas. Her beloved husband, Tom, died from cancer, and Kathleen wrote that she found spiritual refuge in Beyond These Stone Walls.

Before her own death Kathleen wrote to me near the September 23 feast day of Saint Padre Pio, which is also the anniversary of my false imprisonment. I had written a post then that included the “Prayer after Communion” composed by Saint Padre Pio. I sent the post and prayer to Kathleen Riney who was caring for her dying husband at home.

Kathleen wrote that while her husband, Tom, was in the last weeks of his life, she gave him a copy of that prayer printed from that older post. The downloaded page had her name and email address at the top. She had rented a reclining hospital chair to help keep her husband comfortable. Many months after Tom died, Kathleen received this message in her email:

“Kathleen, my name is Kristine. I rented a hospital recliner. I found a paper with the “Stay With Me, Lord” prayer in the chair. I wanted to let you know that the prayer has helped me. I’m scheduled for surgery on November 1st and the surgery is the reason I rented the chair. Somehow that prayer found me and has strengthened me. I wanted to let you know that you touched a stranger in a great way!!! I will read it often. I hope all is well in your life. Thank you, Kristine.”

Accounts such as this are easy to dismiss as mere coincidence, but only if you really struggle to live life only on the surface without ever delving into what I recently called “the deep unseen” in the great Tapestry of God where our lives, through grace, become entangled with the Will of God. Padre Pio had many spiritual gifts in this life that I do not fully comprehend. I wonder if he ever thought that his “Prayer after Communion” would become like a message in a bottle cast into the sea where it would drift into the hands of someone known only to God. Here is that prayer in its entirety:

Padre Pio’s Prayer after Communion

Stay with me, Lord, for it is necessary to have You present so that I do not forget You. You know how easily I abandon You.

Stay with me, Lord, because I am weak and I need Your strength, that I may not fall so often.

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my life, and without You, I am without fervor.

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my light, and without You, I am in darkness.

Stay with me, Lord, to show me Your will.

Stay with me, Lord, so that I hear Your voice and follow You.

Stay with me, Lord, for I desire to love You very much, and always be in Your company.

Stay with me, Lord, if You wish me to be faithful to You.

Stay with me, Lord, for as poor as my soul is, I want it to be a place of consolation for You, a nest of love.

Stay with me, Jesus, for it is getting late and the day is coming to a close, and life passes; death, judgment, eternity approaches. It is necessary to renew my strength, so that I will not stop along the way and for that, I need You. It is getting late and death approaches. I fear the darkness, the temptations, the dryness, the cross, the sorrows. O how I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile!

Stay with me tonight, Jesus, in life with all its dangers. I need You.

Let me recognize You as Your disciples did at the breaking of the bread, so that the Eucharistic Communion be the Light which disperses the darkness, the force which sustains me, the unique joy of my heart.

Stay with me, Lord, because at the hour of my death, I want to remain united to You, if not by communion, at least by grace and love.

Stay with me, Jesus, I do not ask for divine consolation, because I do not merit it, but the gift of Your Presence, oh yes, I ask this of You!

Stay with me, Lord, for it is You alone I look for, Your Love, Your Grace, Your Will, Your Heart, Your Spirit, because I love You and ask no other reward but to love You more and more.

With a firm love, I will love You with all my heart while on earth and continue to love You perfectly during all eternity.

Amen

This coming Sunday, the Sunday before Thanksgiving, the Church celebrates a most important Solemnity. Our politics consume all the press right now, and it is unavoidable. Only one truth is necessary this Thanksgiving. No matter who we elected president, Christ is our King!

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Whether we face the aftermath of our political struggles with sorrow or joy, our coming Thanksgiving requires a heart open to grace. Here are a few posts that I hope might light that lantern:

Four Hundred Years Since That First Thanksgiving

To Christ the King Through the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Saint Maximilian Kolbe and the Gift of Noble Defiance

With Padre Pio When the Worst That Could Happen Happens

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”