• Dr. Agnes S. Thomas

The New Year reignites our hope for new beginnings – perhaps to achieve our goals we didn’t manage to accomplish in the new year, like learning a new skill. Typically, these New Year resolutions are focused on personal goals and are wonderful ways to begin a new year! However, a reflection on what my New Year’s resolution should be began this year by examining the current state of the world. A quick look around the past year’s events and the people I had the privilege to interact with led me to focus on a basic foundational principle for human life: people are interdependent and can act as each other’s keeper. This is one of the social realities quickly disappearing in our fast moving and consumerist society. How do we protect this essential element of our humanity that is critical to our existence? Should we give up on personal goals and aspirations to focus on others? What does it take for us to make this New Year a resolution that is centred on some aspect of this special value?
This is when I went through the chapter on love in letter of St. Paul again. Thus, I take inspiration from his letter to suggest we should or can make one of our new year resolutions to LOVE. St. Paul in his letter to Corinthians (1 Cori. 13: 4-7) explains at length what it means and how to truly love. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.” It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, and it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres.”
When you contemplate on these verses, you realize how difficult it is to love unconditionally at all times. Although there are a handful of individuals that have told me they are able to love like that, I was not fully convinced. To me, these verses feel like an everyday trial and error, as our human minds are often so feeble and a slightest provocation or an unexpected behaviour towards us makes us less loving towards the other. In our simple and fragile human nature it is hard to love without expecting anything in return. However, our communities, our homes and our neighbourhoods beckon to be loved and to be held sacred.
Unfortunately, we are seeing a lot of provocations, all around us we see people feeling betrayed and rejected, societies and groups feeling alienated and excluded, and the aftereffects of these provocations on a local and global level. This is not just limited to our external environment, as in our personal lives we too can sometimes feel unloved or misunderstood. Time and again young people I accompany raise the questions, with such sincerity, of what they can do to fix the world, end the wars, human indignities that is happening across the world. They go on to explain how helpless and useless they feel in situations of the world that feels much bigger than themselves. It is true the problems of the world and the needs of humans seems magnanimous. Thus, the solution maybe to begin at home by us choosing to commit one person to love without ceasing, without expectation, with kindness and patience as St. Paul suggest.
In conclusion, I have arrived at a simple and practical resolution, this year, I am committing myself to loving one another the way St. Paul taught us. And I humbly ask you to consider that before rushing to resolve the world problems first let us focus on attempting to love one another unconditionally outside of yourself this year, like St. Paul taught us. Let us transform the world around us by choosing to love, by being present, and by committing to connect. My prayer is that this year be a year of light that comes from us loving one another that multiply and brings enough to create hope in the immediate speeds you and I occupy on a regular basis. May we find strength and courage to love ourselves without conditions so we can love others unconditionally.