The Baptism of the Lord

Click Here for the Mass Readings for Today:

The feast of the Baptism of the Lord signals for all of us the closure of the Christmas season - that extended celebration and meditation on one of the greatest mysteries of our faith, the birth of Jesus Christ.  His birth has transformed our world and history from within, that is, both in and through our humanity.  When we think about changing the world we tend to think first in terms of social structures, politics, and all things external.  God, on the other hand, chose to start with a transformation of our humanity and to renew the world through the transformation of the heart and soul of man.  The Church reminds the world that true transformation cannot be achieved without the personal transformation of each human person in Christ.  This is the significance of today's feast of the Baptism of the Lord - with each baptism God Himself once again reaches into the depths of man and transforms death into life and restores man to himself.  So the Christmas season opens with God being born into human history and now closes with man being re-born in Christ through baptism.  Our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI said something similar in yesterday's Angelus:

"The Baptism of the Lord suggests quite well the general sense of the Christmas festivity in which the theme of 'becoming sons of God' thanks to the only-begotten Son's taking on of our humanity constitutes a dominant element.  He became man so that we could become sons of God.  God is born so that we could be re-born....With this sacrament man really becomes son -- son of God.  From that point the goal of his life consists in arriving at, in a free and conscious way, that which from the very beginning was his destination as man.  'Become what you are' -- represents the basic educational principle of the human person redeemed by grace."

Beyond the actual transformation of man through baptism, the baptism of Christ also reveals man to himself.  This might be something to remember if you find yourself in a "mid-life crisis"!  With Jesus' baptism we discover our identity and dignity as sons and daughters of God, and we discover the purpose for which we have been created by God.  When we are united to Christ in baptism the Father's words are directed also to us, "this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased."  Not only do these words reveal to us our identity and dignity, but they call us to be faithful to who we are.  We can therefore see how today's feast is not something superfluous to Christmas or to our lives, but calls each of us to "become what you are" in Christ.

A close friend of mine includes a powerful quote from John Paul II in the footer of each email he sends out; a quote which speaks about man's need for Christ in order to understand himself: "For  man cannot be fully understood without Christ.  Or rather, man is incapable of understanding himself fully without Christ.  He cannot understand who he is, nor what his true dignity is, nor what his vocation is, nor what his final end is.  He cannot understand any of this without Christ."

The Church is celebrating the Year for Priests up until June of this year.  So as we meditate on and thank the Lord for the gift of our baptism throughout this coming week, let us also keep in mind the priest who baptized us and thank the Lord for him.  Through the gift of a priest's life to the Church and the world countless men and women are transformed and truly "enlightened" in Jesus Christ, the "light of the world".

(Translations provided by www.zenit.org and www.vatican.va)