January has always struck me as a very odd time to start a New Year, particularly here in the northern hemisphere where there is very little in our surroundings that looks “new.” The trees stripped of leaves, the farm fields frozen in deep ruts, the ponds laced with ice – how does any of that offer a sense of new life, new energy, new resolve?
While many faith traditions and ethnic cultures set their new year’s celebratory clocks by the sun, moon and seasons, landing them in the fall or spring, it’s the Gregorian calendar that has us celebrating a new year in the depth of wintertime. But there is one helpful link between this time of year and an ancient religion: the double-faced Roman god Janus, from whom we get the name of our first month, January.
In Roman times, Janus was the spirit of doorways and archways, and was sacred to the beginnings of the days, the months and the years. Of course, the start of every new day is a threshold time, and has the potential to be a sacred moment.
But we imbue this particular eve and morning with special significance; a time, in the words of Lyn Cox, “when the past and present are stirred together in the cauldron of what we shall become.”
Which brings us to the thorny question of New Year’s resolutions. A perennial question for this time of year is: are you a resolution-making person? There’s evidence going back to the 18th century of people making New Year’s resolutions to better themselves, yet it seems the practice has also always had its distractors and skeptics.
Though I am not a resolution maker myself, I applaud you who are, and wish you well, and luck, too, for when it comes to well-worn, even beloved habits, change is not easy. And as for aspirations and hopes, I am all for following dreams wherever they lead.
In considering why I am not a resolution person, I’ve landed back at that double-faced image of Janus. New Year’s resolutions, understandably, orient us to the future – sometimes so much so that the past is a mere dot in the rearview mirror. Particularly at the moment of the turning to a new year, we can easily be swept up in the yearning to focus solely on what’s to come, and see what went before as done and gone. But Janus looks equally to the past and the future, seemingly saying where we have been is as important as where we are headed. I concur. Leaving the past, to use the language of the season “unresolved,” diminishes the fullness of life.
To resolve is to hold firmly to something, to act with purpose or steadfastness. Whether we look at the past with affection or fury, we live its legacy every day. Sometimes it’s personal, between us and the people with whom we share our days, bearing both embraces and slights. But we also live well-worn practices and worldviews: some bequeath us insight, resilience and courage, while others – such as colonialism, racism and radical individualism – cloud our collective vision of the future, and frustrate our society’s movement towards greater justice, compassion and equity. The past isn’t done and gone: it is alive in our days and ways.
What if we took the ancient guidance of Janus to heart and set aside time every New Year’s Day to meditate upon how it is we arrived where we are, today? What if we paused at the very threshold of the year to look back, over our shoulder? To harvest the blessed moments of care and love, and also hear the call of the past to tend and mend hurts and divisions before launching ourselves through the doorway to a new day and a new year? What if we looked back, and forward, in equal measure? What, then, might we become?
The Rev. Alison Cornish is a Unitarian Universalist community minister living in Shelburne Falls. She is currently affiliated with The BTS Center, which offers programs and events cultivating Spiritual Leadership for a Climate Changed World. Many offerings are available to the public online: thebtscenter.org