Please find peace, hope and joy wherever you seek them, in this customary season of gladness. The ability to reason is part of being human, but every bit as much so are impulses to rejoice and to hope. So though logic may suggest life is inherently sad and futile because it ends, our reflexive reluctance to accept that bleak conclusion leads us, rightly, to use faculties other than logic alone. Hope is just as vital and elemental. And ‘Accuracy’ is not necessarily the same as ‘Truth.’

Few of us can be so monolithically rational as to easily embrace a self-annihilating interpretation; nor should we be. If logic demands we do so, then it – used exclusively – may be thwarting us as much, or more, than it empowers us. Reason itself, arguably, makes it implausible that the marvel of existence could be pointless, however obscure its intent may seem from our finite perspective.

Western culture developed to hold that the cosmos isn’t just an indifferent, devouring void. Anything so amazing, if mysterious, could not be mere happenstance; it had to arise from an act of loving Creation. That led to faith that each human life, by virtue of our consciousness enabling us to ponder our origins and purpose, parallels the mechanism of Creation, and is thus a precious sprig of it. And the Christmas story (in which I personally find deep comfort and lofty joy) proclaims that every such sprig is worthy of love, validation and, if needed, saving, despite what it has done or failed to do.

Whatever you believe, celebrate every aspect of your personhood, and savor hope and joy wherever you find them, or where they find you. To do so is to defy that supposed ‘indifferent, devouring void’; or to negate its power. Your spirit – our spirit – may be stronger than it could be. Besides, you are a member of the human family, and realizing that one is part of a family should always be cause for happiness and belonging.

And for Peace on Earth.