No matter what or who you worship, no matter if you do not worship, (but my liberal leanings do draw the line at Satanists) I wish you the happiest of days. 

If your family gathers at this time of the year, I wish you no wars with siblings. 

If your household is cooking this year, I hope the visitors will wash up afterward.

 If there's a ball game on and dishes to be done, I hope with all my heart that it's not just the women in the kitchen nor the men in the living room but a bit more a gender mix. 

And if there must be alcohol, I do sincerely hope for the sanity of the women, that the men do not bawl from the living room, Hey!  Bring me a beer! but rather stand, walk to the kitchen, and get their own.

I wish you the joy of the new year, faced with fortitude, work ethic, faith in human resilience and a commitment to do and be our best this year.  I hope that each and every one of us face this new year, and each other, with hearts true and strong in acceptance of one another and in a new resolve to respect a bit more those who are different from us.  Whether their difference is marked in skin color, native language, faith, lack of faith, disdain for faith, disability, disadvantage or loss of all hope, I do so hope that we as a nation more diverse in its population than any other nation in the world, will come at last to a true respect.

What?  No bashing on boards?  No all caps accusations of mental inadequacy pointed at that blithering fool who has the temerity to disagree with you?  No bashing, period?  No hate?  Just simple acceptance?

YES!  That is what I hope will somehow magically occur on January 1, 2018, all across the nation.

You will think me a fool and a dreamer.  I am neither.  I am a believer in the incredibly vast reservoir of strength that is humanity.  I am a believer in a better way for America.  And that isn't going to happen from the White House or the Governor's office.  It's going to happen to you and me.  We are going to remember to be polite.  We are going to remember to be open, and honest, and warm.  We are going to remember what it means to be an American again.

We have to.  We are going to fall apart and lose our cohesiveness as a society that stands together if we don't start shuffling our feet in the direction of our own salvation.

I met a woman who told me that the Atheists' sign offended her and though it was not right to tear it down, he should not have put it up, essentially peeing on her holiday!  I suggested that her creche might affect him exactly the same way and pee on his belief system.  To her credit, she said no more.  But I wonder who she's telling her tales to now.  Like the atheists bully me!  Atheists are violent men and women who want to silence the voice of Christianity!

Frankly, I don't think ten thousand flames could even singe the massive, pervasive message of Christianity.  Be like us or go to hell.

Atheists don't believe in hell, by the way.  I'm not sure where they believe they go, but it surely is not to the Christian Hell.  So it's silly to tell them to go to hell.  It's out of context.  It has no point of reference.