Year in review

In the last few weeks of a calendar year news organizations always post a list of what they considered to be the biggest news stories of the year just ending.

The folly of such efforts was powerfully demonstrated this year as some of those lists were already published and discussed before the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami – certainly one of the most significant events of the year and arguably the most significant of all.

Inevitably, those things considered important by the opinion makers of the day often fade into obscurity with the passage of time and small events unnoticed by the great and the wise are later proved to be turning points of great import to the history of mankind.

Thank you, Lord, for the good things of the past year; forgive us our faults; and give us the grace to come closer to you in the days to come.