12/18/85

Time, in two short weeks, will bring us a new year, a new calendar with fresh new pages to be write upon.

What will be written? Is it not for us to know, we cannot pierce the curtain. We can merely send out messages of hope, make wishes.

Wishes? What shall we wish for? Better health? Greater wealth? More joy? Less work, more play?

All worthwhile yearnings, but they will come to naught if there is no peace on earth, no goodwill between its peoples.

Let us then make this earnest plea:

On the pages of the new calendar let it be written in the new year of 1986 no nation lifted sword against another. No nation and no peoples needed to live in fear of war. Or invasion. All lived at peace with each other.

And, O Lord, let our farewell prayer hold true for all the years to come.

Thirty-two years later. Not only are there horrific atrocities occurring around the world, but there’s tremendous unrest in America from blatant racism to xenophobia. Just today, the United States, along with two other nations voted against a United Nations resolution condemning glorification of Nazism.

The unbearable reality of the Trump administration ushers in daily indignations from reducing the size of federal lands (because there aren’t enough places for oil and gas companies to pillage and destroy) to jeopardizing healthcare for millions, including the most vulnerable, children and the elderly.

When my grandmother wrote this invocation, Ronald Reagan was completing his first presidential term and heading into his second. His “Reaganomic “policies proved to be a failure. His reduction in tax rates resulted in increased debt (green line), which he tried to counterbalance by curbing federal spending (yellow line), cutting Medicaid, food stamps, federal education programs, and the EPA.

By October 1987, his machinations and short-sited tax policies set off a stock market crash, known as “Black Monday.” In addition, 747 savings and loan companies failed, requiring a $160 billion taxpayer ball-out.

History is repeating itself not only from an economic and financial point-of-view, but conflicts around the world.

During the Reagan years there was the Iran-Contra affair (Nicaragua), bombing of Libya, apartheid in South Africa, invasion of Grenada, escalation then end of the Cold War, and other strife, some of which was provoked by the US.

Peace is a pipe dream in 2018, just as it was in 1986.