Holiday Blessings to All

In June 2023, a group of diverse mental health professionals were called together to serve on a two-year Mental Health Equity Cohort (MHEC) led by Director of Mental Health and Wellness, Joselyn Spence, MDiv, LPC, ATR.

Throughout December, MHEC members will share a variety of resources and stories to help you navigate through the wintertime, holidays, and beyond. Today, we’re sharing a poem of holiday blessings from Rev. R.J. Robles

 

 

Holiday Blessings to All  

Bless those who are in our hearts during these holidays.   

Named or unnamed- young and old, of every race, faith, and spirituality,  

and every gender experience  

but especially let us continue to lift up and speak the names  

of those whose lives were stolen by all types and structures of violence.  

We ask Mother Earth for their comfort, trusting that there is now love, there is now peace wherever they may be. 

 

Bless those who survive and continue to see a day rise in the rays of your sun.  

Bless every beautiful gender of your creation.  

Bless us on all our different lives and lived experiences.  

For we know that this universe is abundant.  

And refuses any limit, constraint, and binary.  

That refuses anything or anyone that says there is only one right way to be.  

We know that the possibilities are endless  

And each and every one of us are sparks of life and resistance.  

We know that we are our ancestors wildest dreams. 

 

Bless our scars,  

Both physical and emotional, 

For we know they not only bear witness of our collective pain and trauma 

They also draw the body maps of our collective healing.  

Of being forever changed and in constant modes of transitions.  

That we carry collective wisdom and resilience. 

 

Bless the courage of our hearts throughout this season.  

As we continue to root out injustice, ignorance, cruelty, and despair.  

Call on us to remain open to compassion.  

Committed to principled struggle.  

Let our minds, hearts, and hands work together for the restoration of love of one another.  

And deepen in us a co-desire for an abundant life.  

Bless us as we carry today and every day this legacy of love and the fire of resilience.  

For those who have died,  

For those who still live,  

Let us fight like hell for the living.  

May this holiday season be a blessing unto you and yours.  

May we take the time to slow down,  

And re-imagine future possibilities for radical change.  

Trusting the process.  

Knowing in the depths of our belly breaths  

That God is change. 

And for this we remain eternally grateful.  

© Rev. RJ Robles (they/he) 

Rev. R.J. Robles is a chaplain, community organizer, and poet. Their home church is New Covenant Christian Church in North Nashville, Tennessee where they reside. R.J. is a queer and transgender Afro-Puerto Rican living in the United States Southern Diaspora.