Fun thinking about “how we think.”

Today as we celebrate Christmas please remember those families whose loved ones serve in our Armed Forces. For many of these families, Christmas celebrations will not be complete. A familiar voice will not be heard and a chair at the table will remain empty because they have someone far from home. Those of us who are blessed to be with our families today let us remember in our prayers the homes that have an empty chair at the table for the brave men and women of our Armed Forces whose selfless service and sacrifice make our world a better and safer place. For those homes that have an empty chair that will forever remain vacant, may their sacrifice not have been in vain. May God Bless these families today and every day.
Merry Christmas!

On 25 DEC 1863, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote the poem Christmas Bells as he was nursing his son LT Longfellow who had been severely injured during the Battle of New Hope Church in NOV 1863.

Christmas Bells
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along
The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till, ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime,
A chant sublime

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
When from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
And with the sound
The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn
The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said:
"For hate is strong,
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead; nor doth he sleep!
The Wrong shall fail,
The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men!"