December 25, 2014 - My Fellow Nationals – Citizens and residents:
I wish you peace, hope, and faith today and always. By the grace of God, we have been granted the gift of another Christmas. Let our hearts, therefore, be glad. Through the love of God, we have been protected all year from any and all natural disasters. Let our hearts, therefore, rejoice.
In a world in which – at this very moment - there is real trauma, real tumult, real dislocation, and real suffering, our country on this Christmas morning is at peace, and our people, free. Let our hearts, therefore, be thankful, and our spirits strong.
May our hearts, this Christmas permit, us to see each other and hear each other more clearly. Not that I wish for us to see everything that there is to see in each other, or to hear everything. Indeed, what I wish, instead, is that we would see more clearly in each other that which is good.
For it is in focusing less on each other’s shortcomings, and more on each other’s strengths, not only at Christmastime, but all year through, that we find peace; and it is in doing this that we create a path to understanding.
We reflect on Christmas throughout the ages, Fellow Nationals, and we see in our mind’s eye that bright and shining star over Bethlehem – the star about which we have heard all our lives, and which combined with the sacred majesty of the night sky to create an image of beauty and wonder that lives in our minds these many centuries later.
May that image of that deep indigo sky with the many stars scattered across the heavens, and that special star over Bethlehem, inspire within us the desire to be bright and shining stars within our families, within our communities, within our Nation.
Indeed, may that image cause us to strive always to be a force for good, a conduit for peace, and a path to understanding.
Another image that has stayed with us all these years is that of Mary and Joseph alone in the night, and trying desperately to find some place in which their baby might be born. To no avail.
But ponder, Fellow Nationals, Citizens, Residents, how the name of that same Christ Child is today known on every continent on earth – by the rich and the poor…….the weak and the strong…….more than two thousand later. And ponder how the teachings and example of the Christ Child, once he became a man, have become synonymous with compassion, and courage, and caring…………and how those teachings have been a source of such strength for men and women everywhere in times of adversity.
May the image of the Christ Child’s transition from that of a seemingly-vulnerable infant to all that the world eventually knew Him to be, be a source of strength and inspiration to us in our own lives – whatever challenges we may face, and to us as a Nation and a people continuing our positive and blessed march forward.
And so, in this Season that is synonymous on every continent with peace, I extend to you and all you hold dear heartfelt best wishes for peaceful Christmas. And I pledge to you my Government’s commitment to ensure that yours will, indeed, be a hopeful and prosperous New Year.
May God’s blessings enfold us all this Christmas, and may our hearts be filled with thanksgiving.
Thank you.
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