A Homily – The First Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A), The Baptism of Jesus

A Homily – The First Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A), The Baptism of Jesus

 

First Reading – Isaiah 42:1-4, 6-7 ©

Responsorial Psalm – Psalm 28(29):1-4, 9-10 ©

Second Reading – Acts 10:34-38 ©

Gospel Acclamation – Mark 9:8

The Gospel According to Matthew 3:13 - 17 ©

 

(NJB)

 

Listen!

God, the creator of the universe, God wants nothing more from us than this: that we act justly, love mercy and walk humbly throughout the length of our days.

This is the way.

Listen to Isaiah, who made straight the way before him; listen and be mindful.

According to the school of Isaiah, the savior is the person who brings justice to the nations; you will not hear the savior shouting for the sake of vanity, neither in the streets nor on the airwaves, you will not see her cutting people off from their potential, putting them down or diminishing them...that is no the way.

The savior teaches us that justice is expressed through mercy, and that the law is subservient to love.

As Jesus taught…in the tradition of the Hebrew people: the way is to love God with all your strength and all your heart, and all your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

This is the Shema; Jesus summarized this in the Golden Rule, it is the first article of faith.

Be kind to the stranger, be of service to your neighbor, love and forgive…even your enemies; do unto others as you would have them do unto you, and do not do to them what you would not have done to you. Like two headed Janus be mindful of your actions and your inaction, your intentions and their consequences

Love God with all your strength and all your heart, and all your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself; this, Jesus told us, is the whole of the law and the teaching of the prophets...this is the way.

Consider the psalm for today:

It wise to believe in the God of creation; the divine is infinite, undergirding…flowing into everything that exists. The divine is present in all times and places; God is everywhere, omnipresent, in everyone. There is no place where God is not.

God knows all things, God knows you, even as you know yourself, we know this to be true because you yourself are within God, the fullness of you is within the fullness of the divine, from the first moment of your potentiality through each instance of your actual agency as it passes into eternity.

Know this!

It is not God’s voice we here in the wind above the waves. We do not hear God in the thunder. God does not splinter trees or rend them asunder. God is not active in the affairs of human beings; for rather God has made creation, and us within it, free…radically free. Listen and remember, God is not a king. God does not intervene in creation, or the free choices of human beings.

God did not anoint Jesus, human beings did that; anointing is a ritual of the Church, and the good-ol’-time religion which preceded it. Rather, Jesus accepted the mantle of sonship to God and the full burden that this entailed, even to the extent that he endured torture and death suffering on the cross.

Jesus was free to reject the demands of his ministry, but he did not. He could have sold his people out, or encouraged them to take up arms, but he was faithful to the end, he understood the harm that would come to them if he did, and so he accepted the burden that had come before him, setting an example for us all.

Few people are called to serve in the capacity that Jesus served; he was crucified for bearing witness to what is right and good. Few of us have the capacity to love justice so much that they could humbly endure what Jesus endured, while praying for mercy on behalf of those who did him in; that is why we call him the Christ…the anointed one

Follow Jesus: do good, walk humbly, serve justice, love mercy; be a source of healing in the world. This is the way of Christ. Do the best you can, not for the sake of your salvation, but for the good of your sisters and brothers, for the good of all women and men.

Consider the Gospel reading for today, it is a pure distillation of mythological tropes common among the Hebrew people, carrying forward a set of theological themes that were very important in the first century.

Be mindful.

The reading clearly situates the Jesus Movement within Rabbinical Judaism, otherwise known as Pharisaical Judaism.

In the reading for today Jesus is presented as a Pharisee, as a Jew of the Synagogue, his followers address him as Rabbi, and the central concern among the actors: Jesus, Peter, James, and John, concerns a foretelling that Jesus will die, and then rise from the dead, among all of the sects of ancient Judaism only the Pharisees taught the resurrection of the dead.

The author’s of Mark’s Gospel were interested in conveying the message that their teachings were in total alignment with historical traditions of the Jewish people, therefore they depict Jesus as another Abraham, Abraham who was also visited by divine messengers, the author’s depict Jesus him transformed, even as Moses was transformed on the mountain; they show him receiving the blessing of Moses and of the prophet Elijah, as if they were proclaiming that he was heir to the promise God had made with the patriarchs.

This trope is a concrete expression of the faith that the Jesus Movement was keeper of the covenant, in alignment with the law and the tradition of the prophets. The writers of the Gospel wanted to convey the message that in Jesus, the whole history of the people was recapitulated, redeemed and complete.

Here is the story:

Jesus was baptized by John. It was the first moment of his public career. He was baptized, he was purified, he was shriven; the forms had been obeyed.

There were witnesses. Crowds gathered crowds to witness the moment when the heaven opened and the Spirit of God, creator of the universe, the Spirit of God alight on Jesus like a dove.

At the River Jordan, John stood like Moses and Jesus Joshua; the elder would never walk in the promised land, the younger would lead the people to it, cross before them and usher them in.

John is also depicted here as the elder son, who is the Hebrew tradition, not meant to inherit. Like Cain and Able before Seth, like Ishmael before Isaac, like Jacob before Esau, Jesus comes after John; he is the promised son, the one in whom the hope of humanity is secure.

In this trope John is also representative of the goat, in the role of the goat cut loose in the desert, in the rite for the expiation of communal sin, while Jesus is representative of the lamb, taken to slaughter and consumed in the feast. 

First Reading – Isaiah 42:1-4, 6-7 ©

Here is my Servant, in Whom My Soul Delights

Thus says the Lord:

Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights.

I have endowed him with my spirit that he may bring true justice to the nations.

He does not cry out or shout aloud, or make his voice heard in the streets.

He does not break the crushed reed, nor quench the wavering flame.

Faithfully he brings true justice; he will neither waver, nor be crushed until true justice is established on earth, for the islands are awaiting his law.

I, the Lord, have called you to serve the cause of right; I have taken you by the hand and formed you; I have appointed you as covenant of the people and light of the nations, to open the eyes of the blind, to free captives from prison, and those who live in darkness from the dungeon.

 

Responsorial Psalm – Psalm 28(29):1-4, 9-10 ©

The Lord will bless his people with peace.

O give the Lord, you sons of God,

  give the Lord glory and power;

give the Lord the glory of his name.

  Adore the Lord in his holy court.

The Lord will bless his people with peace.

The Lord’s voice resounding on the waters,

  the Lord on the immensity of waters;

the voice of the Lord, full of power,

  the voice of the Lord, full of splendour.

The Lord will bless his people with peace.

The God of glory thunders.

  In his temple they all cry: ‘Glory!’

The Lord sat enthroned over the flood;

  the Lord sits as king for ever.

The Lord will bless his people with peace.

 

Second Reading – Acts 10:34-38 ©

God Had Anointed Jesus with the Holy Spirit

Peter addressed Cornelius and his household: ‘The truth I have now come to realise’ he said ‘is that God does not have favourites, but that anybody of any nationality who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to him.

‘It is true, God sent his word to the people of Israel, and it was to them that the good news of peace was brought by Jesus Christ – but Jesus Christ is Lord of all men. You must have heard about the recent happenings in Judaea; about Jesus of Nazareth and how he began in Galilee, after John had been preaching baptism. God had anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and because God was with him, Jesus went about doing good and curing all who had fallen into the power of the devil.’

Gospel Acclamation – Mark 9:8

Alleluia, alleluia!

The heavens opened and the Father’s voice resounded: ‘This is my Son, the Beloved. Listen to him.’

 Alleluia!

 

 The Gospel According to Matthew 3:13 - 17 ©

 'This is my Son, the Beloved'

 Jesus appeared: he came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptised by John. John tried to dissuade him. ‘It is I who need baptism from you’ he said ‘and yet you come to me!’ But Jesus replied, ‘Leave it like this for the time being; it is fitting that we should, in this way, do all that righteousness demands.’ At this, John gave in to him.

 As soon as Jesus was baptised he came up from the water, and suddenly the heavens opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming down on him. And a voice spoke from heaven, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved; my favour rests on him.’

 

A Homily – The First Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A), The Baptism of Jesus