Published January 16 2025

Sunday January 12 2025

Baptism of the Lord – Year C

Homily by Father Emmanuel Schwab

1st reading: Isaiah 40,1-5.9-11

Psaume : 103 (104),1c-3a,3bc-4,24-25,27-28,29-30

2th reading: Titus 2,11-14; 3, 4-7

Gospel: Luke 3,15-16.21-22

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“Here is your God! Here is the Lord God!”

This is what is manifested in this event, in this epiphany of the Lord, in this baptism of Jesus in the Jordan. Let us pause for a moment to resituate the meaning of John's baptism. John is standing on the eastern bank of the Jordan—that is, outside the Promised Land—so he brings the sons of Israel out of the Promised Land. He exhorts them in a rather forceful manner to conversion, telling them that it is not wise to take shelter under the paternity of Abraham: “Therefore produce fruits that show your repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’” This baptism is a baptism for conversion to prepare the people to welcome the Messiah. One after the other, they come to confess their sins to John, then John plunges them into the Jordan: Your sin leads you to death… You will drown in your sins. And John plunges those who come into the Jordan. He brings them up out of the water, saying: now enter the Promised Land to live in righteousness, to wait for the one who will come to save you.

Jesus comes, he probably spends several days at the Jordan - we see it in the Gospel of Saint John. He spends several days contemplating this crowd, contemplating the sinners who come to recognize themselves as sinners and to let themselves be baptized by John. He also contemplates the Pharisees who probably do not cross the Jordan, but look with some contempt at those who do what John the Baptist asks... Jesus will speak to them about it again in his Passion (Lk 20,1:8-XNUMX). And at one point, Jesus comes - it is Saint Matthew who tells us of the dialogue between John and Jesus at that moment - and Jesus lets himself be plunged into the Jordan, that is to say that, symbolically, from that moment, Jesus commits his life. He agrees to die the death of sinful man. He agrees to die as if he were a sinner, he who is without sin, and, at the exit of the Jordan, Jesus being in prayer, the Father points him out: “You are my beloved Son; in you I find my joy.” From that moment on, one could say, Jesus takes the head of the people of sinners to lead them as we say every day in the prayer of theAngelus, by his Passion and by his Cross to the glory of his resurrection.

And what Jesus symbolically committed in this baptism in the Jordan, he will actually live in the offering of his life, especially in the Passion and on the Cross. It is then a question of walking in the footsteps of Jesus to let ourselves be led by his Passion and by his Cross to the glory of his resurrection.

Paul, in his letter to Titus, develops the meaning of this salvation which is given to us in Jesus. First, he affirms that the grace of God has appeared for the salvation of all men. This grace of God was manifested in the person of Jesus and through the whole life of the Lord Jesus. This grace, he tells us, teaches us to renounce impiety, the lusts of this world and to live in the present time with wisdom — the wisdom of God —, with righteousness and godliness, looking forward to the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, awaiting the return of Christ in glory which we proclaim in the Credo, awaiting the accomplishment of all things, when God wills it. Christ gave himself to make us a people eager to do good, we already heard this reading on Christmas Eve. We can pause for a moment on this expression: "a people ardent in doing good", a people zealous in doing good. What is my ardor? What is my zeal in doing good? How am I concerned with doing good? In one of his speeches in the Acts of the Apostles, Saint Peter at one point sums up the life of the Lord... It can be summed up in eight words: “Wherever he went, he did good.” (Acts 10,38:XNUMX). It is not difficult to memorize the life of the Lord, it is not difficult to be able to enter into an imitation of the life of the Lord: wherever he went, he did good. What have you to do? - Wherever I go, I seek to do good.

And then Paul continues, and what Paul says there, we could say that the whole life of Saint Therese is the deployment, the manifestation. “When God our Savior showed his goodness and love toward men, said Paul, he saved us, not because of the righteousness of our own deeds, but because of his mercy". And I think of this little passage from the Offering to merciful love that Thérèse wrote where she writes:

In the evening of this life, I will appear before you empty-handed, because I do not ask you, Lord, to count my works. All our righteousnesses have stains in your eyes. I want therefore to clothe myself with your own Justice and receive from your Love the eternal possession of You yourself. I want no other Throne and no other Crown than You, O my Beloved!!….. Paul continues: “Through the bath of baptism, God has made us reborn and renewed us in the Holy Spirit.” The three great sacraments of baptism, confirmation and the Eucharist initiate us into the Christian life, that is, they initiate us into life with God, in God-Trinity, so that our whole existence takes place within the very mystery of God, takes place in a relationship of intimacy with the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit. And it is this relationship with God that saves us. It is not a one-off act in our history, it is a constant relationship. This Spirit God has poured out on us abundantly through Jesus-Christ our Savior, that, being made righteous by his grace (and not by our actions) we may become heirs in hope of eternal life.

But if we are made righteous by his grace, then it is a matter of this grace being translated into our actions, doing good, a living with wisdom, justice and piety, which is the fruit of grace in us. To live this, Saint Therese understands that we must welcome this grace in a poor heart, in a child's heart. In the letter she wrote to her sister, Sister Marie of the Sacred Heart, to introduce her to this great prayer to Jesus, which is called manuscript B, Therese writes this:

I understand so well that only love can make us pleasing to the Good Lord that this love is the only good that I aspire to. Jesus is pleased to show me the only path that leads to this Divine furnace, this path is the abandonment of the little child who falls asleep without fear in the arms of his Father…

And I will open a short parenthesis: the life of prayer is learning to to fall asleep without fear in the arms of God, our Father… I close the parenthesis.

She keeps :

"If anyone is very little, let him come to me" said the Holy Spirit through the mouth of Solomon, and this same Spirit of Love also said that "Mercy is granted to the little ones". In his name the prophet Isaiah reveals to us that on the last day "the Lord will lead his flock to the pastures, he will gather the little lambs and press them to his bosom", and as if all these promises were not enough, the same prophet whose inspired gaze already plunged into the eternal depths cries out in the name of the Lord: "As a mother caresses her child, so will I comfort you, I will carry you in my bosom and I will caress you on my knees." O dear Godmother! after such language, there is nothing left to do but be silent, to weep with gratitude and love...

How does this concern us? Next sentence:

Ah! if all weak and imperfect souls felt what the smallest of all souls feels, the soul of your little Thérèse, not a single one would despair of reaching the summit of the mountain of love, since Jesus does not ask for great actions, but only abandonment and gratitude.

This is almost a summary of the whole spirituality of Therese that we have just heard. This is what Paul says: When God our Savior showed his kindness and love toward mankind, he saved us, not because of the righteousness of our own actions, but by his mercy. In contemplating Christ who comes, through his baptism, to assume the sanction that is the death of sinful man, who comes to take our head to lead us through his Passion and his Cross to the glory of his resurrection, let us commit ourselves resolutely to following him, by constantly welcoming his merciful love, by constantly relying on this merciful love.

It is neither our efforts nor the feeling of guilt that will make us change anything in our hearts: it is the merciful love of God, welcomed in our good will, responding to this love by abandoning our whole being to this love, and by a gratitude, a recognition that is translated into concrete charity for our brothers.

Amen

Father Emmanuel Schwab, Rector of the Shrine