Why Do We Celebrate New Year?

We have already left one more year behind and we are about to start a new year. In these moments, reflection is born almost spontaneously in us. We become more lucid awareness of time, of that curious reality that we are spending without taking it too much into account. These are the ideal moments to take stock of the past and also project our gaze towards the future.

Many things that distressed us and seemed almost insurmountable have already happened. Today they seem insignificant and unimportant to us. Looking back, the days that were tough look different. Now we feel calmer and more serene, even in the face of what now overwhelms us the COVID- 19 and that one day will also pass.

At the same time, we feel homesick. Nothing remains. With the old year, not only the difficult and hard things go away, but also the beautiful and good things. And the more one advances in age, the greater is the force with which one perceives the inexorable passage of time. This past year also leaves us with a bittersweet flavor. We have not been what we wanted to be. We have not done what we set out to do. We have not been true to ourselves. One more year that goes by without us having grown in truth, in generosity, in love.

H. Hesse says that "in every beginning there is something wonderful that helps us to live and protects us." What truth is contained in these words when one looks at everything beginning with eyes of faith. Again we are offered a time full of hope and intact possibilities. What will we do with it?
The questions we can ask ourselves are many. We will increase our standard of living and our comfort perhaps, but will our hearts continue to shrink? We will have time to work, to possess, to enjoy, will we also have time to grow as people?

This year will be similar to so many others. Will we learn to distinguish the essential from the accessory, the important from the accidental and secondary? We will have time for our things, our friends, our social relationships. Will we have time to be ourselves? Will we have time for God? And yet that God whom we corner day after day amid so many occupations and distractions is the one who sustains our time and can breathe new life into our existence.

Without faith, our calendar is nothing other than the measure of the rotations of the earth. In twenty-four hours the earth revolves around itself and in three hundred and sixty-five days, around the sun. The day and the year are ultimately nothing more than purely mechanical measurements. Thus, time is like a circle. The earth continues its career, regardless of the sufferings and hopes of the men and women who live on it. Only faith transforms time and gives it meaning. Throughout the year we believers celebrate the holidays that remind us of God's actions, from the birth of Jesus to the resurrection of Christ.

However, we have the bitter experience of the past. When we want to walk through life alone, we end up meeting our own helplessness. Will we not have this year the new experience of living with more trust in the Father? Why is it not possible in these modern times to live with such deep trust in God? We do not know what awaits us in the new year, but we know that God awaits us. We do not know the problems, conflicts, sufferings and loneliness that can shake our hearts, but we can always invoke God. We do not know what sins we will commit and what mistakes we will make, but we can always count on his forgiveness.

Happy New Year 2022

NSINGA., Robert