New Year’s Reconciliations

As 2012 draws to a close many of us, leaders included, pause to reflect on the past year and consider what lies ahead in the new one Some will choose to assemble a list of resolutions they hope will make them healthier, happier, or more successful. Most, if not all, of these New Year’s promises will be discarded within a few weeks. It’s a ritual that has been repeated many times.

This past year has been especially challenging for many of us. The nation has been struggling to regain its economic footing, all while facing an impending fiscal cliff on January 1, 2013. An acrimonious political campaign for president pitted social classes against one another and created legislative gridlock in Washington, D.C. Weather-related disasters destroyed property and dreams for hundreds of persons. Mass shootings have dominated the 24-hour news cycle.

In the midst of all this turmoil it seems we need more reconciliation and less resolutions for 2013. The dictionary defines reconciliation as the reestablishment of friendly relations and includes a theological reference to the end of estrangement between a human and God. On a practical level, reconciliation offers a chance at a new relationship whether it is between two persons or God and humankind.

Perhaps one reason we resist reconciliation is because it involves confession and forgiveness, a willingness to be vulnerable and open about our shortcomings. Reconciliation also implies congruence between our inner lives and our outward selves. We cannot simply promise to behave differently, we must actually live that way. Reconciliation pushes the concept of resolutions to a new level.

My wish for 2013 is that leaders, and their followers, would make a new commitment to reconciliation - between themselves and their teams, between their business and its customers, and between the co-workers who show up to serve every day. I wish for political leaders who would focus less on winning and more on telling the truth and doing the right thing for the country.

Let’s make the New Year our stage for modeling reconciliation instead of offering more empty resolutions. That would be worth celebrating. Firecrackers anyone?