Dear brothers and sisters:

At the beginning of this new year, let us raise our hearts in gratitude to the good Lord for accompanying us on our journey through time. We thank God who never abandons us and always watches over the faithful of our local Church with his merciful love. With gentle persistence he is leading us beyond the constraints of time to eternity.

As time passes, we are continually amazed by how ultimately short and ephemeral life is. So often we ask ourselves: what’s the meaning of our life, and what meaning, in particular, can we give to our days of toil and sorrow? This question permeates history, running through the heart of every generation and of every individual.

But there is an answer: it is written on the face of the Child born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem two thousand years ago. In “the fullness of time,” God became man and remains among us today as the Living One, forever risen from the dead. He entered our history to free us from the slavery of sin and death, and to raise us to the dignity of being children of God.

With Jesus’ Incarnation and Birth, time was, so to speak, forever “touched” by the Eternal God. The time we are now living is the definitive time of salvation and grace. That’s why we can truthfully proclaim that 2024 will be yet another “Year of the Lord.”

While we take our leave of the year that has just come to a close and set out for the new one, we once again entrust to the Lord his little flock, his Church in Vancouver, which is ever striving to be faithful to him. And let us implore Mary, Queen of the Holy Rosary, to intercede for us before the throne of mercy. With her, we are invited to keep our gaze fixed on Jesus, the Sun rising on the horizon of humanity, who is the hope and Saviour of the world.

May the new year bring you and your families many blessings.

Sincerely yours in Christ,

+ J. Michael Miller, CSB
Archbishop of Vancouver