A new year is before us – a blank slate, tabula rasa.  While we cannot foresee our destiny nor discern all the pathways we will follow in 2013, we can establish a mind-set, an approach for how we will participate.

“Goodwill to All” is the third and final Christmas theme that has stayed with me throughout the years. “Goodwill” is where the two previous themes find fulfillment.  This discussion is aligned to bridge into a New Year, a time when we reflect upon the past and prepare for the future. The good news! “Joy to the World” and “Peace on Earth” will become a reality if we practice “Goodwill to All.” This week, I want to explore “goodwill” as we understand it within the human experience.  Goodwill is arguably the most complex of the three discussions because it requires us to interact within our physical and social environment.

Frederick Buechner, an American writer and theologian, once said: “Compassion is sometimes the fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else’s skin.  It is the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you, too.”