Feast of the Baptism of the Lord 2008

The Christmas season for 2007 ends with today's celebration of the Baptism of the Lord. Ordinary Time begins tomorrow, Monday. The color of the stole of the priest shall then be green, like the plants in all its ordinariness. Today's Sambuhay reflection shares something about odinariness, with the word "ordinary" often connoting common-ness, humdrum and routine, uneventful, the "nothing special season." And yet, come to think of this: even in the ordinariness of time and life, when in Christ, ordinary time is as well God's time, a time when God manifests His works of salvation. Everyday then is a day of salvation. Everyday is a day calling us to conversion, to deeper following of Christ. Fr. James Kroeger, M.M. mentioned Mother Teresa of Calcutta (our Living Saint who is now Blessed) saying "We cannot do great things; we can only do ordinary things with great love."

It is good to remember this thought of ordinariness as we celebrate the Feast of the Lord's Baptism. Like St. John the Baptist, I also asked the Lord in my prayer: "Why do you have to be baptized, cueing like the rest of the Jews asking for John's baptism? You were no sinner like them?" The answer that came into mind was this: "Look, by doing so, God is entering into the human history, into the human reality." Indeed, the human situation has become in Christ something altogether not to be rejected but valued and loved. God in Christ has deemed it worth His life to join and participate.

In fact, by having Himself baptized, Jesus showed how deeply He has entered the life of each one of us. Now we can say that God understands what we may be going on personally, each one of us. Talk of empathy: God in Christ can now be seen as Someone Who very much knows what we are going through because He himself has gone the way we went, except sinning. The mystery of the Incarnation has then become a stupendous fact, a reality we cannot altogether simply brush aside! God has become now in Christ a human person, capable of deep understanding of our plight as humans! Thus, calling on Him, letting Him know what we're at should not be a difficulty if only we are ready and willing to trust Him.

By having Himself baptized like the rest in St. John the Baptist's time, it became easy for Jesus to share with us His own baptism. In fact, as we remember that He was baptized Himself, we remember our own baptism too. He has us baptized into His own life: we have become like Him, a Child of God. Remember when St. Paul, then Saul, was confronted by Jesus on the former's road to Damascus? Jesus asked Saul, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting "me"? He did not say "Why are you persecuting the Christians? (as if they were any different from Him.)"Indeed, by our own baptism, Jesus identifies Himself in each one of us. The person beside you in Church or at the train or in work, when baptized is Jesus Himself! Wow! What a thought! A powerful one at that! We are indeed seeing in each baptized person Jesus Himself, having Jesus Himself right in him/her. The other, baptized as s/he is, is therefore worth our respect and adulation, service, and love. Each of us baptized has Jesus to defend us with His very life!

Herein lies our dignity and calling to mission. Like Christ, we too are called to share in the mission of Christ as mentioned in the First Reading: "...for the vistory of justice, I have grasped you by the hand: I formed you, and set you as covenant of the people, a light for the nations, to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out prisoners from confinement, and from the dungeon, those who live in darkness." (Is 42: 7)

Herein lies our mission: that doing our best, we may be Christ for today! As He has done His role to save us, so we are also to help in saving others, bringing others out of the darkness of ignorance, poverty, sin, and corruption! We who have been brought into the light are called to bring out into the light many more we know who are in the darkness of their lives.

Let us therefore heed this call, for as long as we live out our Christian life to the best that we can, in whatever situation we may be in, being faithful to Him, we may actually, before we even know it, bringing Christ into this world, God Who is with us everyday in the ordinariness of time.

God bless