Fr. Bob - Feast of the baptism of the Lord
Today we celebrate the Feast of the Baptism of our Lord. When you think about baptism what comes to mind for you? When I was a kid, I was taught that baptism “removed the stain of original sin”. Hearing that I thought of the water used in baptism as a sort of spiritual detergent strong enough to remove the toughest of stains, even the stain of original sin.
I also heard that if the stain on our souls wasn’t removed, we may not get into heaven. Maybe that’s why parents wasted no time in getting their child baptized. Two weeks after the baby was born was about the usual time. I was baptized three weeks later because my dad was out playing tennis. My mother wasn’t happy about that.
Things have changed since then. Does baptism still remove the stain of original sin? It does. It’s just that we now use a deeper language to describe the same thing. While washing away of the stain of original sin describes more an external action God freeing us from the power of sin and darkness describes more an internal action of the heart.
But to focus only on the removal of original sin as if this is all baptism is, would obscure three equally important truths. The first truth that baptism celebrates is revealed to us in Jesus’ baptism at the Jordan River.
After his baptism as Jesus emerges from the waters of the Jordan a voice from the heavens was head. “This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased”. Jesus came to let us know that we too are God’s beloved in whom he is well pleased.
The second truth that baptism celebrates is understood in what Paul says in Romans 6, “If we die with Christ we will rise to the newness of life in Christ’. Baptized at a moment in time we then spend the rest of our lives living our way into our baptism.
We do it by willingly undergoing a death to all in us that wants to be our own god. Only as we let go and die to the ego’s need to control and be in charge can we then be raised up to new life in Christ.
As we undergo this process by God’s grace we are gradually transformed into the person God created us to be. This happens not so much because of what we’re doing for God, but because of what God is doing in us.
The third truth that we celebrate in baptism, -that in baptism we are initiated into the Body of Christ. Jesus describes the same concept with the image of the vine and the branches John 15:1-6.It’s the community in Christ we know as the church. As his disciples we walk the journey with Jesus not alone but together.
Three aspects of the new life in Christ that baptism celebrates, our new identity in Christ, our new self in Christ, and our new community in Christ. How important is baptism in our journey to God?
Pope John the twenty third was asked by reporters on the day we became pope. “This must be the most be the greatest day of your life?” He responded, “No, the greatest day of my life was the day I was baptized.”
The day we’re baptized the gun goes off and the race begins. With Jesus the journey to God is an adventure. And even better running the race with Jesus makes the journey one where no one is left behind, not even you and me.