The first time he appeared was in his mother’s arms. And just as with his saving resurrection, the first witnesses to his birth were the women: the mother and the mid-wife, according to some traditions. At that wondrous moment the mother might have recalled the words of the angel: You will…give birth to a son…the Son of the Most High…and his kingdom will never end.
The second appearing was to his father, and then the shepherds and finally, the magi from the East. Lots of folks would have seen him after that, as far away as Egypt, and then back home in Nazareth. Until that day when he approached his eccentric cousin…Elizabeth’s son, who lived in the desert and dressed in a camel’s skin and started baptizing people, telling them to make straight a way for the coming Messiah.
Until that day, which we commemorated in this morning’s Mass in an unusual way, with the Blessing and Sprinkling of Holy Water, intended to remind us of our Baptism. This is especially appropriate as we celebrate the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, and recall how John the Baptist baptized Jesus in the Jordan River, inaugurating his public ministry.
But what is this Baptism, this washing with water which we reflect upon today?
As the ancient prayer I prayed to bless the water a few minutes ago reminds us, God created water to be a source of life and purification, both inside and out. washing dirt away on the outside, and baptismally washing sin away on the inside, giving rise to a life-giving spring of eternal life, bubbling up from deep within.
But why was Jesus Baptized? Was he in need of cleansing? Not at all. He was a man like us in all things except sin. No sin was within him.
But so much did he love us, that he not only became one of us, but he stood there among the sinners waiting to have their sins washed away, in order to encourage us to return to God with our whole heart, and to be totally immersed in his love.
Indeed, the Greek word baptisma literally means immersion, as when John baptizes Jesus by immersing him in the waters of the Jordan River, and as Jesus entirely immerses himself in our human condition so that he could understand our weaknesses and our frailty.
But then what happened at the moment of Jesus’ Baptism, the moment when his public ministry of meekness and humility began in a life of sacrificial love?
You heard what Saint Luke told us. The clouds parted and the Holy Spirit showed himself in the form of a dove, while the voice of the Father acknowledged his beloved Son.
Here stands Jesus, acclaimed by his Father as the hope of the prophets, the light for the nations, sight to the blind, freedom to prisoners and the way out of all the dark dungeons of selfishness and sin.
Here stands Jesus, who with his strong right arm outstretched upon the Cross, conquers the Evil One by suffering and by laying down his life for his sheep.
Here stands Jesus, come to “baptize humanity in the Holy Spirit…to give humanity God's life and his Spirit of love…” (Pope Benedict XVI, 13 Jan 2008.)
It is that same Jesus who we receive in the Sacraments of water and blood which first flowed from his side as he hung upon the Altar of the Cross. The Sacrmaents of Baptism, by which our sins are washed away, and Eucharist, at which we drink his Precious Blood, the promise of eternal life.
So let our prayer this morning be the one which I prayed a few moments ago, at the end of the sprinkling with holy water on this Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, that “Almighty God [might] cleanse us of our sins, and through the celebration of this Eucharist, make us worthy to share at the table of his Kingdom.”
