A Christmas wish

You have worth.

Your worth is an entitlement you needn’t earn and cannot lose. Yours is no more or less than any other’s.

Neither wealth nor status will amplify it. Neither job nor country will diminish it.

Skin color cannot enhance it. Nor can ancestry, family composition, faith, politics, belief, health, ability, age or gender.

Mistakes won’t steal from your measure of worth. It persists when you stumble, when you fail, when you disappoint.

Your worth simply is. It is yours.

But there’s a corollary: if you have worth – and you do – then so do I. So does everyone else. Everyone else. Every billionaire and each worker, retiree, parent, child, homeless person, inmate, migrant, hostage, refugee.

Everyone.

I express an ideal, of course, one observed as often by our inclination to deny the worth in others as by our lousy capacity to honor it.

I wish we were better, especially today as we lean into “peace on earth, good will to all.” Especially this year as horrific acts of violence against innocents mar the season.

You have worth.

Merry Christmas.