“Another year over and a new one just begun . . . Let’s hope it’s a good one without any fear.” So sang John Lennon 51 years ago in his hit “Happy Xmas (War is Over);” and it’s a nice thought, is it not?
For me, 2022 was colored with different brushes – my last four months of work as a minister, which culminated in an emotional service on May 1st; the joys of my first eight months of retirement, including beautiful weather during spring, summer, and early fall here in Edmonton; more time spent with our Calgary-based grandson, Ethan, who is now 19 months old, and who is an endless source of delight; the joys of singing, particularly the December 9th and 10th performances of Handel’s Messiah with the Richard Eaton Singers, and which were lifetime peak experiences for me; the first COVID infection for both me and Kim in early November; and the ongoing triumphs and travails of living in strange and turbulent times.
I appreciate how the New Year’s Eve song “Auld Lang Syne” includes the repeated phrase “We’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet,” especially this year since I don’t feel sanguine about 2023. Perhaps it will take extra offerings of cups of kindness from me to friends and family this year, and from them to me, to “make it a good one without any fear.”
A gaggle of issues cloud my vision: COVID-19, which is supposed to be over, but which resulted in the death of more Canadians in 2022 than in 2021 and 2020 (19K for 2022, 16K for 2021, and 14K for 2020); the presence of Danielle Smith as Alberta’s premier, a leader who is an undoubted fascist in my opinion, but whose success in winning 53% of the votes of UCP members in October has helped to make noxious views on COVID, Albertan “nationalism,” and climate change seem more normal; the 11th month of the Russian invasion of Ukraine; three cold snaps in Edmonton (early November, early December, and just before Christmas); and a “bomb cyclone” that impacted much of North America, which made the end of the year challenging for many of us.
Perhaps climate disaster will not impact us too forcefully this year. Perhaps Ukraine will defeat Russia this year and Vladimir Putin will be overthrown and replaced by a less aggressive imperialist. Perhaps Danielle Smith will lose the May 29th election in Alberta and an NDP-led government will bring down my blood pressure. Perhaps it will become clear to me that COVID really is just another cold, and not a lethal, multi-system vasculitis, which is what I have come to believe it is.
Perhaps.
In December, Kim and I watched a new movie on Netflix – “The Swimmers” – and it brought many of my feelings to the surface. It tells the true story of two sisters from Damascus in Syria; how civil war begins to disrupt their adolescence in 2011; how the dreams of one of them to become a member of the Syrian 2016 Olympic swimming team in Rio are shattered in 2015 by Russian bombing of their city; how they fly to Istanbul that year from where they hope to enter Europe to gain refugee status for themselves and their parents and younger sister; how they, along with about 30 other refugees, nearly drown making the perilous journey on a dinghy from Turkey’s Mediterranean shore to a Greek Island; how Greek and Hungarian authorities make their flight to Germany violently challenging; how landing in Berlin does not make it possible for them to bring their parents and younger sibling to safety until 2018; and how one of them competes at the 2016 Rio Olympics, as a member of a newly formed “Refugee Olympic Team.”
I liked the movie for many reasons. For one, it makes concrete the stories of the destruction of countries like Syria and the horrors — and often death — that come to many millions of refugees trying to escape from places like North Africa and the Middle East to Europe and North America.
I contrast the stories of these refugees with Canada’s Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, especially given the racism he used in the 2015 federal election. Harper’s Tories were set to lose to the NDP under Thomas Mulcair until Harper took a sharp racist turn based upon fears of Syrian refugees and his call against face veils worn by some Muslim women and for a “Barbaric Practices Hotline.” These racist pivots led the NDP to sink from first to third during the campaign, and helped Justin Trudeau’s Liberals win victory instead (see two contemporary sermons, “Who Owns the Earth” from Sept. 20, 2015 — and Competing Visions from Oct. 25, 2015).
The refugees portrayed in “The Swimmers” stand head and shoulders above Stephen Harper in my estimation; and I would much rather have them be my neighbours than a politician like Harper who traded in racism for so many years.
I view Syria in 2010 as a cautionary tale for what could happen to Canada in the next few years. In 2010, Syria was a prosperous, intercultural country filled with endless potential. But today it stands ruined under the continued mis-leadership of dictator Bashar Al Assad.
Russia is trying to turn Ukraine into another Syria. I hope that Putin has overshot his ambition and this horror is turned back by Ukraine and those of us who support Ukraine.
Danielle Smith tried to set herself up as emperor in Alberta in the first draft of the Sovereignty Act in November, but she reversed course when her dictatorial ambitions met fierce resistance. I hope such forces remain strong in 2023 and beyond.
Climate disaster continues to wreak havoc on the world’s natural environment. But perhaps 2023 will not be the year that its depredations overtake us here in Canada.
COVID-19 continues to mutate and flourish. Perhaps 2023 will not be an even worse year because of it. But not one single country is making moves to clean indoor air in a way that might bring COVID’s devastation to a halt. So, who knows?
I hope 2023 is a year in which all of us find clarity, growth and love. This can be the case regardless of how the problems I mention above unfold; especially if I remember to offer cups of kindness to those I meet; and if I remember to drink from those same cups when they are offered to me.
Happy New Year!
Until February, Ian
P.S. For more background on the deep pleasure I took from the December 9 and 10 performances of Handel’s Messiah, I recommend the sermons I wrote about Handel over the last several years.
Notes and sermons from Edmonton 