My Hopes for 2015

I don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions and to be honest, wishing people a happy new year sometimes seems alien to me. I don’t consider this my new year in a spiritual sense and while my company switches its books and accounting on December 31, as a holiday, it leaves me feeling…unfulfilled.

I don’t talk to God on December 31 – or I do, but no differently than any other day of the year and I don’t make any effort to stay up until midnight.

But I do have hopes…and I do wish a happy new year to my Christian friends and neighbors, professional and personal.

And so, though I don’t feel right about making resolutions, I do feel right about expressing my hopes and dreams…

I hope that 2015 will be a year of peace, a year of safety. I hope the Third Intifada that began in 2014, will end very soon and we won’t experience another in 2015. I hope the war we fought this summer will not be repeated next summer.

Please let 2015 will bring a greater sense of unity within my small country but also across the world. I hope people will know that we have so much more in common than that which separates us and if we don’t start working to make our planet a safer and better and healthier place, we will all suffer.

I hope that 2015 will be a year of innovation – of amazing inventions and technologies that will heal people, enrich their lives.

I hope that 2015 will be a year that is terror free – here in Israel and around the world. I hope that religion will be something that pushes people to peace and love and communication, not death and war.

I hope that 2015 will be a year of life – where no one will die because they don’t have access or can’t afford the right medications or the right doctor.

Please, God, let 2015 will be a year of prosperity for Israel and for all the nations of the world.

I hope that 2015 will be a year in which we bridge our differences – religious, political, economic, national…all of them…

I hope that 2015 will be the year when Israel elects the best government for its future, not because of party lines but because these are the leaders which will guide us into the future in safety, in health, and yes, in peace.

I hope that 2015 will be a year of abundance – of rain where it is needed, of food where it is lacking, of warmth where it is cold and cool and comfortable where it is hot.

I hope that 2015 will be a year of respect – for women who deserve equal pay and equal standing in society; for mothers who deserve the right to choose if they will work, when they will work; for fathers who have equal rights and say in the upbringing of their children; of blacks who should respect whites and whites who should respect blacks; for religious tolerance so that no one is abused because of their religion, sex, race.

And finally, I hope 2015 will be a year of love…so much love that it will wipe out the hatred that has plagued this world since it was created…love between brothers, true love between peoples, between countries.