Last month, before the Christmas Break, I conducted a very unscientific poll of a randomly selected group of students. I asked them when are the 12 Days of Christmas, are they the days before December 25^th? Most of those whom I asked said they were the 12 days before. They were wrong. Today in fact, is the 12^th Day of Christmas, when, according to a popular song “my true love gave to me 12 Drummers Drumming.”

That song is not very old, only a century or so. A more ancient event commemorated today is the traditional Feast of the Epiphany. It celebrates the visit of some Magi from the East to the new-born Christ child. The only gifts given then were gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Not to mention the gift of God himself to the whole world.

We are beginning a new year and a new semester. It is an opportunity for new resolutions to make ourselves more worthy of God’s great Gift.

January 1^st seems an odd time to begin a new year. It’s winter time, it’s cold and not apparently logical. Why begin now and not in the springtime when the Earth begins to awaken in blooms and blossoms?

The reason is due to the ancient Romans. The office of the Consul was the highest elected office in both the Republic and the Empire of Rome.

Consuls – and there were two of them – were elected for a term of one year. They began their office on what they called the Kalend of the god Janus. We call it January 1^st.

There is certain logic to that date. Unlike most of the rest of the world, the Roman calendar was based on a solar year. That is to say, the number of days it takes the Earth to circle the Sun. It took them awhile to establish that it took 365 and ¼ days. But, on January 1^st, the Earth is actually the closest to the Sun it will get all year. That takes some quite sophisticated astronomical calculations to determine.

This is one reason, almost everyone else then and now used a lunar calendar. The 28 days it takes a new moon to become a full moon. This is easy to observe. All one has to do is look up in the sky and find the moon.

Even into modern times, European calendars began on March 21^st, the time of the Spring Equinox, when the amount of sunlight equals the amount of night darkness.

This year of 2016 (which everyone accepts as the actual date) is especially auspicious. It is a leap year, an Olympic year, and an election year. It is also a Holy Year – a Jubilee – proclaimed by Pope Francis as a Year of Mercy.

Holy Years are usually proclaimed every 25 years. But, Pope Francis is in a hurry. He is 79 years old and the next Jubilee is scheduled for when he would be 88 years old. He himself has said on more than one occasion that his Pontificate will not be a long one.

And so, we have this Year of Mercy to literally turn our hearts towards compassion for others. In many ways, we will be reminded of the special graces of this gift the Pope has given us: the gift of forgiveness.

Mercy itself is not limited to time or space. It should be a life-long virtue. Even when it won’t be Christmas anymore.

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