Baptism of the Lord, January 12, 2025

2025 Jan 12 SUN: BAPTISM OF THE LORD F
Is 40: 1-5. 9-11/ Ps 104: 1b-2. 3-4. 24-25. 27-28. 29-30 (1)/ Ti 2: 11-14; 3: 4-7/ Lk 3: 15-16. 21-22

We have had an interesting few days. We received more snow than we're used to. And from my point of view, it's a hardship. It's tough to get around.

Of course, we can think of the inconvenience of the snow and realize that there is no comparison with what people are undergoing with these fires in the Los Angeles area. We know that real hardship is common to the human family generally. 

Today we are completing the season of Christmas. And this is a time for merriment. But I believe that as year after year gets added to our ages, we are all the more aware that even merriment does not do away with hardship. And we want to make sure that our hearts are united with those who are suffering for any reason, whatever. And of course, that leads us to prayer. And we can all increase both the time we spend in prayer and its intensity. We see very, very clearly how much we need those words from the first reading today.

"Comfort. Give comfort to my people." This is an acknowledgment that comfort is needed and it is a universal need. Really, these scriptures taken together are kind of a summary of the Christmas season. Isaiah is, as we know, associated with Christmas and with Advent. The letter of St. Paul to Titus is used at two different Christmas Masses. And it is always remarkable to hear those words. To hear "God and Savior Jesus Christ," to know how early in Christianity the divinity of Jesus was affirmed. 

And then we come to the Gospel, one of the portrayals of Jesus' baptism. As we said at the beginning of Mass, Jesus had no need of a baptism of repentance. But he submitted to baptism just as he submitted to the human nature that he assumed. He wanted to be completely united with us. And this baptism is a sign to us of the fact that he intends and he remains completely united with us in our human nature.

So we reflect upon both the merriment and the pain which are associated with the season of Christmas. And especially how it must have been incredibly strange for the Son of God himself to take our griefs upon himself. And we can look at this as a preparation for what the rest of the year brings. 

Easter is relatively late this year. It will fall on April 20th. That means that Ash Wednesday is not until March the 5th. We see the baptism of Jesus as a boundary between his hidden life, of which we know practically nothing, but what we heard two weeks ago on the Feast of the Holy Family about Mary and Joseph searching for Jesus who said, "You know I had to be in my Father's house, in the Temple." We have just that little window on his youth. But then when he was about 30 years old, he received this baptism and he began his public ministry, which we think was about three years. We are led into sober thinking. That is, in our lives of prayer we are developing an awareness of the needs of the whole human family. And we find ourselves moving more deeply into the mystery of Jesus embracing our state of life and lifting us up by dying for us. So we have several weeks of Ordinary Time and then in early March we enter into Lent, which will prepare us to celebrate more fully the Easter mystery of death leading to resurrection. We give thanks for these gifts and as we remember Jesus' baptism, we seek to be immersed more deeply into his mystery.