Second Sunday in Ordinary Time A
How great to have green vestments again as we want to let the life of Christ born in us anew to grow ever more mature, as green represents growth and health. It is also delightful to look at the Baptism of Jesus again from last Sunday. The Epiphany, or Theophany or Appearance and Manifestation of God in human flesh to save the world is indeed worth pondering again. The main problem of the world is sin and death, that egocentric self-centeredness that is loveless and lifeless.
And here we see Jesus walking towards his cousin John the Baptist. John saw Jesus coming towards him. Jesus is always coming towards us in all the events and circumstances of our lives, and ultimately in death we will see him most clearly. He comes as the beloved one, sinless, beautiful, perfect, innocent and pure. Not therefore to be cleansed by baptism in water, but to identify with the sinful, weak and broken oppressed throng of humanity and plunge into the Jordan to sanctify the waters and empower them through the Holy Spirit and divine fire to be used in sacramental baptism to purify us from sin and give us the life of the Spirit. The life of the Spirit and grace in Christ.
John says ‘I myself did not know him’. Of course he knew Jesus as his cousin. So this must mean ‘I did not know him to be divine and the Messiah, God incarnate. But now that I have seen the Spirit descend on him like a dove, I know him now as the Lamb of God who is fully capable of taking away the sins of the world. He baptizes with fire and the Holy Spirit though his Mystical Body the Church. I must decrease and he must increase now. He must be revealed to Israel, and ultimately to the world.’
Isaiah had prophesied that Israel is meant to be the servant of God for the whole world and a light for the nations, so that the salvation of God in Christ may reach the ends of the earth. All are called as St Paul reminds us to do the will of God by being sanctified in Christ, becoming saints or filled with the Holy Spirit of love, and constantly call on the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ. To be in relationship with God our Father in Christ, and breathing by the breath of God through His Spirit being poured into our hearts.
Behold the Lamb of God! How awesome that we pray those words at every Mass. It is sacrificial language as the lambs were sacrificed in the Old Testament as a dim foreshadowing among a small people chosen to prepare the world for the universal sacrifice on Calvary represented in every Mass. Divine Mercy intends to embrace the whole world in Christ, the second Adam reversing the Fall of humanity and opening heaven itself, so we can hear the voice of love: you are my beloved called to intimacy with me for all eternity. Sin and death which alienated us from God has been conquered.
As St Cyril of Alexandria preached: So, rejoicing in the sacrifice of the Lamb let us cry out: “O death, where is your victory? Where, O death is your sting? (1 Cor 15:55) Henceforth it will be unable to denounce sinners for their weakness, for God is the one who acquits us. A greening Good News.