Part I – Akemashite Omedetou – 明けましておめでとう
This year, 2026, is the East Asian Year of the Fire Horse. The year comes in with unstoppable energy that can overwhelm us if not prepared. It’s bold, fast-paced, and deeply personal, pushing us to take steps forward—even if we’re not quite sure where we’re headed
Be prepared for big changes, new careers, new homes, letting go of what’s not working, or starting fresh with bold moves.
We should be prepared to break free from old routines with a sense of courage. Speak truth with confidence and seek to live authentically with a sense of purpose. Simultaneously this is a period that will definitely call for living the Middle Way, a way of balance and wisdom.
Still, amidst all the excitement, staying grounded is key. Not every urge needs to be chased, and not every opportunity is the right one. The Horse encourages us to move with heart, but the Fire reminds us to tread carefully.
This year calls for bravery and wisdom.
Part II – The Four Freedoms Redux
The Four Freedoms were proposed in a State of the Union message U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered to Congress on January 6, 1941. These are four fundamental freedoms that people “everywhere in the world” should enjoy. They are 1) Freedom of speech and expression, 2) Freedom of worship, 3) Freedom from want and 4) Freedom from fear. I suspect that many people recognize them from the Norman Rockwell series of four oil paintings made in 1943. The paintings are both nostalgic and, today, aspirational.
To put these foundational goals in context, in 1932, Roosevelt inaugurated the New Deal, to raise the nation out of the Great Depression, which began with the crash of the stock market in 1929. While in Europe the depression further compounded the economic dislocations produced by World War I and led to the rise of communism in Russia, Nazism in Germany, and fascism in Italy. Asia also witnessed the rise of Japanese militarism.
The insertion of the Four Freedoms into the yearly address before congress was a way for Roosevelt to prepare congress, and America, for the hard work and sacrifice on the horizon that would be World War II. With prescience Roosevelt was also preparing our country for life after the war.
I see the Four Freedoms as the Four Noble Secular Aspirations that we must insist upon for all people of America as well as people around the world. We are living in a time of unimagined wealth as a nation. However, the vast majority of that wealth is held by oligarchic plutocrats, enabled by a corrupt, self-aggrandizing Washington leadership and their sycophants. These forces thwart the distribution of this immense wealth to those who have the least, or even to those who are in the middle. This also pits one group against the ‘other’ on various levels, re-institutionalizes racism, misogyny, and sanctions violence.
By revisiting the Four Freedoms we gain perspective on what is important to a society. By revisiting them now we understand how close we are to losing them.
But – we have not lost them yet, not quite. It is not the time to despair; it is the time for resolve and resistance.
If we take our Bodhisattva vows seriously, WE have an obligation to speak up for the people whose voices have been suppressed, the LBGTQ+ community, the marginalized and disenfranchised, the colleges and universities. WE have a responsibility to join with our sisters and brothers of faith to stand up to antisemitism, Islamophobia and the attempted imposition of White Christian Nationalism as an ersatz State religion. WE must insist that health care is a human right not a choice, that children in the richest country of the world do not go to bed hungry, that families are supported not dismissed. WE must support immigration reform, so that hundreds of thousands of people coming to our country to escape violence in their homeland or economic despair are not abused, violently displaced, separating families and causing anguish.
Compassion is the Buddhist Path. The beginning of a new year provides us an opportunity to reignite the fire of our Buddhist vows and this year to do so through the redux of the Four Freedoms, the underlying theme of which is compassion.
Gassho with love . . . Monshin