Search
"New Year's Message" Jan 22, 2021
-
Greetings of Christ’s peace and love! I pray that these words find a place in your hearts to dispel the frustrations, sufferings, grief, and loneliness of those who have lost loved ones due to the coronavirus pandemic. Christmas has been a great reminder of God’s infinite love for us in the incarnation of Jesus. Born as our Savior, He came to bring light, joy, and peace to the world!
This message of God’s constant and caring presence is reflected in the inspiring acts of frontline and other essential workers this past year. Their sacrifice and heroism have been a source of courage and perseverance during months of hardships, uncertainties, and other challenges. The arrival of the COVID-19 vaccines is a blessing of renewed hope and a much-awaited answer to people’s prayers and aspirations of getting back to our normal life.
The outlook for the new year is hopeful but depends on us to make it a reality. It allows us to turn the page of time and history to brace ourselves for what better things it offers us. One good thing the pandemic taught us is that we are all in this together, and the best answer to its disastrous effect is our unity and solidarity. Pope Francis said recently in the backdrop of a divided and polarized world, that “a crisis can be overcome by the antibodies of solidarity.” This was the central message in his recent encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, – the call to global fraternity and social friendship, that all people will live together as a family, as brothers and sisters to one another, treating each other with dignity and equality.
Furthermore, in his message for 2021 World Day of Peace, Our Holy Father promotes a culture of care as a path to peace, urging us against the prevailing culture of indifference to the sufferings of others, of waste, of hatred and confrontation, to practice the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church. Let this culture of care start in the family, the fundamental nucleus of our society, where we first learn how to live together and relate to each other with mutual love and respect.
The new year brings a sense of renewal, a chance to reflect on who we are as people of faith and how we might become better followers of Christ. The lessons of the past year highlighted our global interconnectedness and solidarity, our belief in the sanctity of life, and respect for the dignity of every human person. We learned that showing our love for one another, friend or stranger, can be as simple as wearing a mask. The inconvenience of such practice is far outweighed by the opportunity to show our regard for the wellbeing of one another.
The Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God ushered in the start of the new year. Now is a perfect time to invoke the loving intercession and maternal protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary to help us join together in mutual resolution to live the Gospel values of faith, hope, and charity, as well as to grow in our commitment as responsible stewards of God’s many gifts to us, and to pursue the common good for all people.
After a year of so many limits, God is asking us to dream of renewed happiness, even in seemingly unworkable circumstance and unresolved issues. God is asking us to let happiness descend in our belief in Jesus Christ, who descends to earth not to bring fear or destructive judgment, but to bring HOPE. God is asking us to accept happiness not as a packaged product, but as an enlivening gift that helps us to see possibility. And even more than an insidious virus or poisonous injustices, it will spread, if we, like Jesus, take every opportunity to share it with others.
Be happy. Live it. Share it. A New Day has dawned, named Jesus Christ. May God bless us with the peace, joy, and hope 2021 brings, even with the uncertainties and trials on the horizon.
Happy New Year!
Reverend Fr. Robert T. Cooper, Pastor