We are finally here. Ready to say good-bye to this year with its shattered dreams, deaths, and learning new ways to try to be together as a community. We’ve been through a terribly polarizing year not just in this Nation but throughout the world, The question is whether we have learned how to be better human beings.
It’s also been a year that offers us hope. Many of us responded to the killing of George Floyd by calling for new ways to not just do policing but to care for our neighborhoods. As terrible as the Covid crisis has been, it has forced us to examine structural inequities in health care and society in general.
The real question for us in 2021 is how we will rebuild our society torn apart by anger, hate and polarization. Please note I said how, not if. As a people who say we are committed to the vision of justice Jesus came to give us, this is our task for the New Year.
Prayer for the Day
Awaken us, O God, to new possibilities in our lives,
And breathe in us your grace and your mercy;
Open us, O Lord, to new ways of thinking about our world
Which seems so confusing and troubling.
Free us so we are not bound by our past
But look to the future in hope and expectation.
We ask this in the name of him who is our Model,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
For last year's words belong to last year's language
And next year's words await another voice.
T.S. Eliot, poet, from “The Four Quartets” (1888-1965)
Look deep into yourself, into another. It is the center that is everywhere. That is the holy journey.
Anne Hillman, American writer
The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
The Lord is good to all and God’s compassion is over all creation.
Psalm 145:8-9