One, Two or Three?

Homily for the Feast of St. John the Evangelist

How is it following Christmas and the birth of Jesus, we find ourselves contemplating the burial of Jesus and the empty tomb? To complicate matters, today’s feast of St. John the Evangelist is sandwiched between yesterday’s martyrdom of St. Stephen and tomorrow’s slaughter of the Holy Innocents. What were the framers of the church calendar thinking?

The fact is that they want to bring home the point that the mystery of the Incarnation, the Word of God made flesh in Jesus, the child in the manger, is connected to the totality of God’s plan to bring salvation to a broken world. The totality of the mystery is present in all its components, beginning with the Incarnation. The mystery of the birth, passion, death, resurrection and glorification of Jesus are present at all times in the fullness of the Paschal mystery; and, therefore, present in our Eucharist. The church may emphasize one aspect of the mystery in a particular liturgy, such as Christmas, but we must keep in mind that the entirety of the mystery is made present to us so that we can participate in it for our benefit. So, yes, this is why today we peer into the empty tomb while at the same time we peer into the manger at the Christ child.

The person and personality of John are complicated issues over which scholars have been poring for quite a long time. Some believe that the apostle John, the evangelist John, and the Beloved Disciple are one and the same person. However, the theological depth of the writings of the evangelist seen counterintuitive to the person of the fisherman who worked alongside his brother James and their father, Zebedee. At the same time, it is important to recognize that the Beloved Disciple is never named in the Gospel that bears John’s name. However, whether we are celebrating one man or two or three separate men is really of little consequence. As the first reading indicates, the writer is sharing his experience of Jesus with us – what he has seen, heard, and touched have obviously excited him to the point that he feels compelled to share it with us. He shares with us the Word of God which has brought many believers to life in Jesus.

As we celebrate this man’s contribution to our faith, may our personal faith be ever deepened by the commandment of love that Jesus gave to us through John the Evangelist.