Mark 10:45

Tag: Baptism

  • Immersion

    Immersion

    The Baptism of the Lord (A)

    Matthew 3:13-17

    A German immigrant living in Italy asked how best to learn Italian. The advice he got was simple: Go down to the marketplace and spend time there. Listen. Speak. Make mistakes. Do this enough times and the language will become yours.

    That was it: No textbook, no computer program. Immersion, pure and simple. And it worked. In time, he spoke Italian fluently.

    Immersion is really what we celebrate as we remember the Baptism of the Lord. In ancient times, it wasn’t the custom to stand at a baptismal font and be sprinkled with a few drops of water. No, people were plunged into it, going under as the old, sinful self, and coming back up as the new, redeemed self.

    That practice was done in imitation of Christ’s own baptism in the Jordan by John. Of course, Jesus didn’t need repentance. Still, he chose to plunge fully into the waters – with sinners. With us. Knowing our weakness, our confusion, our need for mercy, God didn’t just stand and watch from a distance. He entered the water. And not only entered, but completely immersed himself in the human condition.

    Thus he teaches us that belonging – that taking up our mission – is revealed in immersion, not observation. For the baptized Christian, life isn’t a spectator sport, something to merely observe, but something to totally immerse ourselves in. Just as that man didn’t master Italian by reading a book or using a computer program, we don’t learn to live like Christ by occasional exposure to him or his Church.

    That brings up the difficult questions Christ wants us to ask ourselves: Do I live a “Christmas and Easter” type faith, or do I live it every day? Do I look at others in need and hope someone will help them, or do I “take the plunge” and do it myself?

    No matter how we answer such questions, let us remember that we learn the language of Christ by immersion: Prayer, reception of the sacraments, being an active part of the community, and by practicing mercy, especially to those who we may think least deserve it.

    If we aren’t where we know we need to be in these things, that’s OK. God has given us time. To learn the language of love, forgiveness, and self-gift, we must go down to the marketplace and spend time where those things are spoken. Where is that? Not the clean, clear water of a baptismal font or an easy chair, but the muddy and unclear water of humanity – of the cross. But as Jesus showed, that’s the place to do as he did, to immerse ourselves fully.

    That is what our Lord, Jesus Christ showed us, not just at his baptism, but by his life, death, and resurrection. And that’s what the Father showed when He said,”This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

    In the same way, we don’t learn how to live “fluently” as God’s beloved sons and daughters by watching from the shore. We learn it by immersion.

  • The Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

    The Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

    Malachi 3:1-4; Hebrews 2:14-18; Luke 2:22-40

    February 2nd is a day of celebrations. Many know it as Groundhog Day, the day when it seems the whole world watches the behavior of a groundhog in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. What many may not know is that this lighthearted little distraction began over a century ago as a Protestant attempt to take attention away from the Catholic celebration of Candlemas. By ancient tradition, February 2nd, the last day of Christmas, is the day on which candles to be used throughout the year are blessed at holy Mass.

    February 2nd is also reserved for a much different kind of celebration. At memorial services around the country, people will gather and candles will be lighted to honor four chaplains who in World War II served on board the USS Dorchester. On this night in 1943 the Dorchester was torpedoed by a German U-boat in the icy waters of the North Atlantic. Out of time, options, and life preservers, these four men – two Protestant ministers, a Jewish rabbi, and a Catholic priest – gave up their life jackets to four soldiers without one, locked their arms together in prayer, and went down with the ship.

    This is exactly the kind of heroic witness that goes to the heart of the greatest celebration on February 2nd – the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord. For, from the moment of their own consecrations, each of these men had, like Christ, committed himself to bringing the love and light of God to those around them. While none knew the fate that awaited him, each spent every day preparing for it; offering themselves to the Father that others may live. When the final moment came, each man came to it exactly as Simeon came to the Temple; in the Spirit, using the gifts only God can give, for the same reason that Christ came in the first place – that others may live.

    But their lives and deaths are more than just a good story; they point the way for us. We too are consecrated to the Lord. At our baptism, each of us received a lighted candle while our parents and Godparents were told, “This light is entrusted to you to be kept burning brightly. This child of yours has been enlightened by Christ. He (she) is to walk always as a child of the light.” The Feast of the Presentation is the perfect time to remember that moment and re-dedicate ourselves to it. As children we depended on others to teach us the faith and to help light its fire in our hearts; as adults we are charged to pass that faith on to others. In both ways, we are called to present ourselves to the Lord and to live out our consecration to Him.

    Begin conformed to Christ in this way will mean that we like him are to be signs of contradiction; teaching life to a culture of death, showing what happiness is to a world so frustrated in its pursuit of pleasure, and living the spiritual life as a model for those who see only the material. That will no doubt bring joy but also rejection and suffering. Jesus experienced this; as we heard in the letter to the Hebrews, he himself was tested through what he suffered. But the author doesn’t leave it there; he concludes by saying that he is able to help those who are being tested (Hebrews 2:18).

    This is the most hopeful note of all, for it means that whether those moments of testing sting like the ice water of the North Atlantic or burn like the refiner’s fire, Christ has not abandoned us; to the contrary, he walks with us, the light for our path and the Light of the world, constantly forming and conforming us in ways more and more like himself – as the prophet Malachi said, a sacrifice pleasing to the Lord.

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