Christmas Weekday
January 6, 2023
Today’s Readings:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/010623.cfm
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we may be used to celebrating the Feast of the Epiphany. But those who generate the Church calendar have reserved that celebration for this coming Sunday.
We are blessed instead with dynamic readings, triumphant in tone, calling us to celebrate our life in Christ:
Beloved:
1 John 5: 5;13
Who indeed is the victor over the world
but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
….
I write these things to you so that you may know
that you have eternal life,
you who believe in the name of the Son of God.
In a way, John calls us to a personal epiphany — the realization of the indescribable gift of grace we have received through Baptism. He enjoins us to live audaciously within the power of that realization.
In our short but powerful Gospel, we see Jesus burst into that audacious living:
For purchase, see:
https://fineartamerica.com/featured/the-baptism-of-jesus-jeff-haynie.html
It happened in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee
Matthew 1:9-11
and was baptized in the Jordan by John.
On coming up out of the water he saw the heavens being torn open
and the Spirit, like a dove, descending upon him.
And a voice came from the heavens,
“You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”
In the power of Jesus
rising through the Baptismal waters,
may we too live each new day
in cascade of faith, hope and love.
Poetry: Variation on a Theme by Rilke from Breathing the Water by Denise Levertov
A certain day became a presence to me;
there it was, confronting me--a sky, air, light:
a being. And before it started to descend
from the height of noon, it leaned over
and struck my shoulder as if with
the flat of a sword, granting me
honor and a task, The day's blow
rang out, metallic--or it was I, a bell awakened,
and what I heard was my whole self
saying and singing what it knew: I can.
Music: Cherish by Aeoliah
Lavish Mercy 