We, the members of the Belfast Humanist Group, would like to offer greetings and good wishes for your New Year celebrations, and we have no doubt that, whether those celebrations take the form of a glorious binge, or a quiet evening at home with the family, you, along with hundreds of millions of others, will await the stroke of midnight. Then, having raised a glass to 'the Future', you will realise that the new year has arrived.

We shall, as usual, review our way of life in the past year and make our usual crop of New Year resolutions, however short-lived they may be. But this is not an ordinary New Year: it is the start of the third millennium since the beginning of the Christian era, so perhaps we should reflect on where Christian 'truth' has led us, and what it offers for the future. Can we stand back from years of brain-washing, and in the light of reason ask whether Christianity has been a true guide to human happiness and whether we should trust it for the future?

To be blunt; has our philosophy been based on a collection of religious and nationalistic mythologies, force-fed to us before were old enough to apply to them the test of reason; and are we unable or afraid to apply that test now? Have we tried to live a decent life because some cleric has with one hand dangled before us the carrot of everlasting life, and with the other, applied to our behinds the stick of eternal damnation? Perhaps we should dispense with the cleric, and love our neighbour without reward or punishment, simply because that is the only way civilisation can survive.

Nationalism, like religion, is a backward-looking, self-centred concept. Like religion, it has its myths, icons, banners, buzz-words and martyrs. It is for ever talking about its rights and never mentions responsibilities. It rules some people 'in' as the Nation/Elect, and it rules all others 'out' as the Non-Nation/Damned. Combine these forces of nationalism and religion, set them in opposition to others similar, and they will tear any society apart. Look at human history, or look around the world today  the evidence is everywhere.

In the name of the three thousand dead and many more thousands bereaved in the thirty years of violence in Northern Ireland, we must ask ourselves: have our religious beliefs and nationalisms any degree of culpability? There can only be one answer! Together these twin evils bestride the world, causing death and devastation, leaving the people who really love their neighbours to help comfort the bereaved, and rebuild their lives and restore their lands. Do we really need more horrors in the next century and beyond to prove the point?

If we really wish to increase our own happiness and that of our fellow men, women and children, we must forget the myths and dogmas that have misled us in the past. We must widen our horizons and look to the future. If we could only say with Tom Paine, "The World is My Country, Mankind is My Brother, and My Religion is to do Good"; then we would have every prospect of a Bright and Happy 2002.

Belfast Humanist Group

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