Canadians living in the Cayman Islands are preparing themselves for their celebration of Thanksgiving, or as in Canadian French “Jour de l’Action de grâce”.

Out of the 46,000 people living in the Cayman Islands, there are nearly 2,000 Canadians residing or working here.

The day of Thanksgiving is declared a national holiday in many places throughout Canada, with the Atlantic provinces of Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia being the exceptions.

The holiday, celebrated on the second Monday of October each year, is used to commemorate the country’s achievements, and is also used as an expression of gratitude and celebration of the good fortunes of the previous year.

The Canadian Parliament, in its proclamation of the holiday in 1957, defined Thanksgiving as “A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed.”

As a liturgical festival, traditionally Thanksgiving corresponds to the English and continental-European Harvest festival, with churches decorated with cornucopias, pumpkins, corn, wheat sheaves, and other harvest bounty.

English and European harvest hymns sung on the Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend, and scriptural selections drawn from biblical stories relating to the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot.