The First Reading today seems so pessimistic and cynical but perhaps there are some days when we feel just like the writer of this book. When everything seems to go wrong, when nothing, not even our Christian faith, seems to have any meaning. Depression is a very common phenomenon in our society today. And this even though we are materially better off than we ever were. Is that perhaps what the writer is trying to tell us? Namely, that we are looking for happiness in the wrong places, that we are in a never-ending search for novelty. One of the favourite words of advertisers is 'NEW!'. But real happiness is to be found in the things that never change, in the basic values on which our lives need to be built - truth, love, justice, companionship, sharing, friendship, peace. We spend so much time, money and energy looking for the good things in life and they are there right under our nose. God, happiness and peace are always to be found in the here and now.