New Year's Day 2007

For a number of years I have been a fan of the Bible Alive daily reading notes which are based on the Eucharistic readings of each day. I strongly recommend them (http://www.biblealive.co.uk/). Here is don't know for sure but for most of us the course of twelve calendar months does not run smooth - our lives are a mixture of blessing, joy, trial and suffering. We pray, however, that whatever life brings we would know God's presence and blessing.

Today we celebrate the feast day of Mary, Mother of God. Her life, too, was a mixture of blessing, joy, trial and suffering. It is right and fitting that the first day of every year is dedicated to her. Mary was Christ's mother but she is also the mother of every believer. We ask for her prayer and intercession as we 'put out into the deep' of this new year.

A New Year begins with many good and noble resolutions - research shows, however, that most of these resolutions run out of steam by 31 January, some run on to the end of February but only a trickle get past 31 March!

What is at the heart of a New Year resolution? Isn't it about wanting to change something in our lives - something negative perhaps, like our weight or a bad habit(smoking, for example), or something positive, like taking up a new hobby, moving house or a fresh direction in life (a new career, for example)? May we be so bold as to suggest that at the heart of our resolutions is the desire to be happy? To know that our lives have dignity and worth? Happiness is the human quest. Are you happy? Are you content with your life? Do you know the meaning of life? Do you know how to be happy?

The gospel is really the message of how to be happy in this life and the life to come. Why not make the following your New Year resolution: To love God more dearly, follow him more nearly and give your life to him day by day. Or, to put it another way: why not resolve this year to grow in your relationship with God? The essence of happiness, the way to fulfilment as a human being, is to grasp in ever deeper measure that 'when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman' (v.4).

'God sent this Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out "Abba, Father". We are children of the Father, co heirs with Christ, and through him we partake in the divine nature.'

Numbers 6:22-27 Psalm 66(67):2-8 Galatians 4:4-7 Luke 2:16-21