Please join me now in a litany for the season. I invite you to respond with the words, “We remember. We forgive. We love.”

• For gifts we yearned for, but did not receive…
  For things we received, but never wanted…
• For those who offered us cheer when what we needed was comfort…
• For those who gave us gifts, but never their presence…
• For those who offered us love but we could not accept it…
• For ourselves, who could not give what was needed…
• For those we have loved deeply, who have left us too soon…
• For holidays that didn’t live up to our hopes…
• For ghosts of Christmas past that haunt us to this day…
• For those who, like the innkeeper, turned us away…
  And for those we rejected, fearing we had no room in our homes or our hearts…
• For the times we saw a star in the East, but failed to follow it…
• And for times we followed it faithfully, but it did not lead where we hoped…
• For wise men and women, whose gifts we rejected…
• And for those whom we thought were wise and trusted to our detriment…
• For miracles gone unnoticed until it was too late…
• For salvation that still has yet to arrive…

For all these things, we pray that we may be granted an abiding serenity in all our memories, and that we may find peace now and in the days to come. Amen.