Peace on earth should be a year-round pursuit

Peace on earth.

That aspirational sentiment this time of year always springs from our inner angels, our wish that the world would be a better place for everyone.

And yet there is so much wrong with the world this year, as there has so often been.

On Christmas Day 1991, President George H.W. Bush addressed the American people about Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s resignation, marking what Bush called the end of “one of the greatest dramas of the twentieth century, the historic and revolutionary transformation of a totalitarian dictatorship, the Soviet Union, and the liberation of its peoples.”

Bush said that “as we celebrate Christmas, this day of peace and hope,” he wanted to reflect on these events, thanking the beleaguered reformer Gorbachev for his efforts. He blessed the people of the newly created Commonwealth of Independent States — including Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus — that replaced the Soviet Union. And he returned to the theme of idealism: “On this special day of peace on earth, good will toward men, may God continue to bless the United States of America.”

But as it always has been in human history, earthly peace would not be eternal. Today, Ukraine continues to be torn apart by a Russian war of aggression. Civilians and soldiers, men and women and children, are dying and mourning and fearing and fleeing. Yet as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week in his address to Congress, “Against all odds and doom-and-gloom scenarios, Ukraine didn’t fall.” We must stand with Ukraine.

It is not the only ongoing conflict on this harried Earth, nor the only site of misery. From Yemen to Myanmar, violence has wracked and bedeviled communities and civil society. People face hunger or famine in Ethiopia, South Sudan, and Somalia. Gang and drug-fueled brutality seed chaos from Mexico to Haiti and elsewhere. The world is roiling with refugees and migrants heading somewhere, anywhere, that will be safer than home. We must ease their pain.

There is discord here, too, as the United States confronts a possible recession and a bitter political moment. Trust decays among neighbors and friends. In this, the richest country in the world, we have ended neither homelessness nor hunger, not even for children, and millions still live in poverty. Our young and old are despairing, turning to drugs to escape. We must do more.

As we gather and count the blessings we have, we know that so many others need the same.

But we must do more than talk about peace on earth. We must help each other achieve it, honoring this season of hope with acts of charity and compassion. And we must do that beyond this holiday season and beyond this calendar year, honoring each and every day with shared values in our pursuit of peace.