The League of Women Voters of New Castle County (LWVNCC) President Marjorie Johnson's message for January 2021 is included below...

2021! A New Year! Hopefully, a better year, a safer year, a healthier year, and a year when eventually, we can once again hug our loved ones, visit the sick, and gather together for shared events and celebrations.

As we say good-bye to 2020 -- all the devastation, the losses, the killings and the demonstrations, the political discord, a bitter election, and the economic freefall, let us remember all those who were on the front lines every day trying to keep our essential services going. They are the heroes of 2020 and we owe them much gratitude.

As a League, we look forward with hope to a new year of action. No matter your spiritual background, I share with you some words of Richard Rohr, Franciscan director of the Center for Action and Contemplation: “We believe that action and contemplation, once thought of as mutually exclusive, must be brought together or neither one would make sense…. To pray is to participate in perhaps the most radical movement of all…..Contemplative prayer allows us to build our own house. To pray is to discover that Someone else is within our house and to recognize that it is not our house at all. To keep praying is to have no house to protect because there is only One House. And that One House is Everybody’s Home…. We become very different kinds of citizens, and the state will not so easily depend on our salute. That is the politics of prayer…..Our house is too big.”

Let us build a big house!

Let me also say, how saddened we all have been by the death of our state LWV president, Carol Jones. You have all read her amazing history with the League that Letty sent out to everyone. But on a personal note, she was an amazing mentor and leader, and it was a privilege to work with her. She will be missed on so many levels. We are most grateful to Sandy Spence who has stepped in as acting president and is, despite her already full plate, continuing the work of the League at the state level.

-- Marj Johnson