Baptism as the Key

Homily for the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ

The readings for today’s liturgy should sound quite familiar to you. The first reading from the prophet Isaiah is proclaimed every Advent. The second reading from St. Paul’s Letter to Titus includes a paragraph that was proclaimed on Christmas. That the Church chooses these two readings to accompany St. Luke’s report of the Baptism of Jesus should give us a clue as to what the Church wishes to impart to us on this particular feast. It is simply this: this feast recapitulates the themes of the entire Advent-Christmas Season.

We hear the prophet announce the future coming of the Messiah with heightened anticipation. The Gospel reading moves us from anticipation of the coming of the Messiah to a fulfillment of God’s promise. The baptism of Jesus reminds us that Jesus has come to us not only as a helpless infant but as our anointed Messiah. This dimension of the Gospel opens us to a future yet to be fully realized in our lives.  The reading from St. Paul is similar to the Gospel in that it too both heralds the appearance of Jesus and promises a future fulfillment for us.

In this feast, then, we celebrate the notion that the Lord is coming, the Lord has come, and the Lord will continue to come to and through us into the whole world. It is that last statement that should hold our attention today. As I mentioned on Christmas, this celebration is NOT an anniversary or birthday party. The Incarnation is not something that happened. It is happening. Christmas is now.

Whenever we include something about baptism in church bulletins or on social media news feeds, we usually include a picture of a shell – an implement that is often used to pour the water on the heads of an infant as it is suspended over the baptismal font. However, a different symbol might be helpful in describing this sacrament. I speak of a key, an implement that is used to unlock a door so that we are able to pass through it. For baptism does just that. Baptism unlocks the spiritual reality of our faith and makes it possible for the person to look at the world through eyes of faith. It unlock the spiritual path that will lead the person to God. It unlocks the mystery of the incarnation in that person so that he/she can become a temple in which God lives. Emmanuel – God with us – lives within every baptized person. When we look into the face of a baptized person, we look into the face of God who has fashioned each of us in our mothers’ wombs. Because Jesus has taken on our flesh, our human nature has been granted a dignity that makes it immortal.

Of course, the key of baptism unlocked something else entirely for Jesus. When John baptized Jesus, the door that was unlocked for him was the mission for which his Father had sent him. Jesus already saw through the eyes of faith, already walked upon the spiritual path to life with God, and was the living truth of the Incarnation himself. However, the key of baptism for Jesus, which John was hesitant to perform for Jesus, was the inauguration of the public ministry of Jesus. Immediately upon coming up out of the waters of the Jordan, Jesus would wander off into the desert where he would spend forty days fasting, a fasting that was meant to show that the words spoken of Jesus at the Jordan were the truth – He was the beloved Son in whom God was well pleased.

St. Paul reminds us yet again that all of this happened because God chose to do it. It didn’t happen because of anything we had done. Actually, it happened in spite of what we had and have done. God richly poured out upon us kindness and generous love in the person of Jesus. Because we are baptized, God is now waiting for us to live out that kindness and generous love in our person. When we do that, we will in fact be continuing to unveil the mystery of the Incarnation. Through kindness and generous love, we will make every day a Christmas day. During this coming week, the decorations will start to go back into storage. Perhaps in your own homes, they already have done so. When we take them out of storage next year, may we do so having continued to reveal God’s love and kindness to the world.