Wow! Where did 2014 go? This is it – it’s all over tonight, and I’ll have to spend the next month scratching it out to write 2015 as

I remember that the calendar has, in fact, changed to 2015. For many people, New Year’s is a to celebrate. And I have always been curious to know what people are celebrating. On one hand, a year is past, and there might be a lot of things to celebrate from the precious twelve months. On the other hand, it seems that the bigger celebratory impetus comes from the promise of a new year with limitless possibilities.

One of my favorite prayers in our tradition is from Night Prayer in the New Zealand Prayer Book. As the prayer is offered at the close of day we pray, “…what has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done; let it be.” I think this is a fitting mediation for the last day of the year as well. I suspect that most New Year’s celebrations are about the promise of the New Year and that a lot of folks have some form of dissatisfaction with the year just ended. In many ways that dissatisfaction is subconscious, but I think it’s there.

The New Year’s resolution ritual is part of that realization. We make resolutions to be different, to be better, to be healthier – whatever it may be. It is a silent commentary on how we judge ourselves at

the close of the year. Something is amiss that needs fixing. I also look to the food traditions of the Pennsylvania environs I was raised in. We eat pork and sauerkraut. And whether or not the lore behind the tradition is true anymore, it is in the DNA of the holiday. One piece of the tradition says we eat pork because pigs forage always moving forward, never back. Another, and one that my German-ancestor grandfather on my mother’s side would add, is that sauerkraut helps “cleanse” you as you start another year. Again, each of these metaphors places the positive on the new, and involves a shedding of what has been.

And let’s be honest. Another reason we celebrate New Year’s is because it is a good excuse to throw a party. If we’re truly disconcerted by the flip of the calendar to a new year, an unavoidable reminder that time marches on and that the numbering of our days grows fewer all the time, there is little else that is as distracting than a raucous party with our family and friends – especially cramming in with thousands in places like Times Square. In the midst of so much fun who has time to overthink what it means deep in our psyche?

What has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done; let it be. Like a fresh piece of wood at the start of a project, or a blank piece of paper a new year stretches out in front of us. It’s not a matter of righting past wrongs, or overcoming past failures – at least it doesn’t have to be. It can simply be like waking up in the morning to the sunrise and thanking God for the new day. Every day is full of opportunity without being laden with guilt or concern for the perfection of the day that preceded it. If the New Year is hard on you for some reason; if you are a super duper resolution maker (regardless of how well you fulfill them), be kind to yourself today and tomorrow. Thank you, Lord, for another year in which to live and learn and love and serve.

Tom+

Lord it is night. The night is for stillness. Let us be still in the presence of God. It is night after a long day. What has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done; let it be. The night is dark. Let our fears of the darkness of the world and of our own lives rest in you. The night is quiet. Let the quietness of your peace enfold us, all dear to us and all who have no peace. The night heralds the dawn. Let us look expectantly to a new day, new joys, new possibilities. In your name we pray. Amen.