When I was a teacher, I was wishing students a “Merry Christmas” in the halls. They’d return the cheer and enjoy the holiday music I was playing in my room, the sounds of the season spilling into the hallway.

Then another teacher came up to me and asked, “Are you sure that’s wise to do? Shouldn’t you be more culturally sensitive?”

At that moment, I saw the Muslim kids in the hall. The Arabs, Persians, Indians, Turks, Bosnians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Nigerians, Ethiopians… At that moment, I realized that “Merry Christmas” might not be what they wanted to hear.

I said to the teacher, “You’re right! I should do better!”

To a young student from Egypt, I shouted, “Christmas Mubarak!”

He joyously returned, “Christmas Mubarak, Mr. Webb!”

I smiled to the other teacher. Cultural sensitivity accomplished.

In our school, in my classrooms, we wished everyone a happy holiday for the religion of their choosing. Happy Diwali, Eid Mubarak, and so forth. If someone wanted to say “Happy Holidays!”, I’d happily respond in kind. Joy is meant to be shared and faith is to teach us all. I didn’t know the expression “righteous envy” at the time, but it’s what I felt. As we all talked through the year about how we strove to be better people, I found inspiration in that, regardless of the faith or lack thereof in the speaker.

I say “Christmas Mubarak” and mean it. Joy and blessings be to us all, from my heart to yours.

“Not to think badly of anyone, not to wish ill to him though we have suffered at his hands, not to hurt him even in thought, this is an uphill task, but therein lies the acid test of nonviolence.”

~Gandhi, Ashram Observances in Action

 “A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

~Jesus, John 13:34-35

As a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I live with an understanding that people are able to receive revelations to offer guidance and comfort. God loves us, but we often confuse love with removing all problems. That’s not love, that’s co-dependence. Love is providing us with warnings when things are coming our way so that we can make ready for them. We are here on earth to learn and experience things, and those things involve dangers, hazards, pains, and trials.

If we return love to God, we heed those warnings, no matter what their source. We are able to have insight into the truth of those warnings and, as we give our hearts and minds over to trying to better understand our existences in a way that approaches God, we are more sensitive to those promptings and more likely to choose to act upon them.

God does not want us to experience our lives blindly. But it is up to us to accept the vision for the future and to be able to withstand it as we understand it. There are terrors approaching, but we can prevail if we heed prophetic warnings and make our preparations.

The Great Wall of China is forbidding, cold, impersonal, and crumbling.

The bridges of Venice draw tourists by the hundreds of thousands.

The bridges of London are famous and vibrant and connecting.

The bridges of New York City sing with Gershwin’s departed spirit, in that soaring clarinet introduction.

How many bridges have been put at risk due to the weight of the locks being fastened to them, fastened in the name of love?

The Berlin Wall is famous for having been torn down. Nobody wants to build it again, nobody who loves.

These things are a matter of personal choices. One is not thrust into one or the other against one’s will. One picks a course, a direction in life, and then arrives at the destination. If one is not pleased with an ultimate destination, different choices need to be made while still in mortality in order to avoid that destination.

And if one is sure of arriving at a destination, one needs to consider one’s choices all the more carefully – there is nothing sure about arriving anywhere for a person not tending one’s course.