the birth of John the Baptist

Today we celebrate the solemnity of the Birth of St. John the Baptist. Only three times in the Church’s year do we celebrate birthdays. December 25th is the most obvious birthday we commemorate.

Daily Mass goers know that on September 8 we mark the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary, but we mark it rather quietly in comparison to the solemnity with which we celebrate her Immaculate Conception nine months earlier.

Today, June 24th, we celebrate the birth of the famous son of Zechariah and Elizabeth. The Archangel Gabriel had said to Zechariah about the son his elderly and presumably barren wife would conceive, “Many will rejoice at his birth!” (Lk 1:14) and today we join that in that jubilation.

Jesus would later say, “Among those born of women no one is greater than John” (Luke 7:28), and the Church’s liturgical calendar puts that truth into prayer: after Jesus, no one born of woman has a greater celebration associated with his worldly visible debut than John the Baptist.

It’s important to ask why the Church has always considered this feast so important. I think the fundamental answer is because the Church first considers the life of John the Baptist so important and second considers the events of conception, gestation and birth highly significant aspects of his life.

John’s vocation to give witness to the Lord, to go before him to prepare his way, began not when he appeared at the Jordan in camel’s hair, but in the womb. Before he was conceived, the Archangel Gabriel told his father, “Even before his birth, he will be filled with the Holy Spirit” (Lk 1:15).

We saw an effect of this at the Visitation, when John leaped in the womb of his mother pointing out the presence of the prenatal Lamb of God within Mary (Lk 1:44). What God said to Jeremiah in last night’s first reading, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations” and to Isaiah in today’s, “The Lord, who formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him,” could just as easily be said about John.

He was formed in the womb and consecrated to be a prophet to the nations in order to bring God’s people back to Him, and he was already carrying out that consecrated mission from his earliest days.

These truths about a consecrated mission from the womb, however, apply not just to Jeremiah, Isaiah and John the Baptist.

The truth is that the Lord knows every one of us that intimately before he forms us in the womb. We can all exclaim with the words of today’s Psalm, “Truly you have formed by inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb!” None of us is a number, a census statistic, to God.

Just like John the Baptist had a vocation and a mission from before he was born, each of us is formed by God with a divine destiny and given a vocation and mission in this world to achieve that destiny and help others achieve their own.

While there will be specific differences between your and my mission and John’s, there are several characteristics in common.
•Like John’s, our mission is given by God as part of God’s plan for us from the beginning.
•Like John, the Lord fills us with the Holy Spirit at our baptism to help us accomplish this mission.
•Like John, we are called to recognize who God is, that he is so great and holy that none of us is worthy to loosen the straps of his sandals (Mk 1:7; Lk 3:16; Acts 13:25). This recognition makes the Lord’s desire to stoop down and wash our feet even more mind-blowing (Jn 13:5).
•Like John, we need to recognize that we’re not the Messiah, that we’re not God. That means that we, like John, recognize that we don’t call the shots — God does — and we trust in His will.
•Like John, we need to make straight the paths for God to rule in our life. For John, that meant going out into the desert to pray, fasting on locusts and wild honey, dressing in a way that symbolized his interior repentance and reparation. For us, it means going away from our distractions to pray, living a penitential and reparative life and adorning ourselves with sacrificial love.
•Like John, after we’re living a converted life, we are called to summon others to conversion. John did it at the Jordan River. We’re called to do it at the Acushnet River, and in our homes, in our schools, in our workplaces. We have the mission to help prepare the way for Christ to come into the lives of those around us.
•Like John, we’re called on to decrease so that Christ may increase in others lives. In the lives of parents, especially those whose children are being called to the priesthood or religious life, there is a great need for this humility so that the Lord’s influence in the lives of those we love may grow.
•Like John, we’re called to point others to the Lamb of God. John did it when he saw Jesus at the Jordan. We’re called to do it by pointing people to Jesus in the Eucharist.
No matter what our state of life, or age, or sex, each of us is called to imitate John the Baptist in these areas.
As we read in today’s Gospel, at John’s birth everybody wondered aloud, “What will this child become?” That is the question people have at the birth of every child.

It was asked at our birth by our parents and many others. The parents present here this morning, in one form or another, have asked it hundreds of times about their own children. Zechariah and Elizabeth would never have dreamed in their little village of Ain Karim that, here in New Bedford, more than 2000 years later, we would be remembering their son’s birthday.

Even with all the miraculous occurrences surrounding his conception, little could they have foreseen the role he would play in salvation history — his life, his martyrdom, his being the precursor of the Son of God in birth, in preaching and even in death.

Similarly, few parents who bring their child to be baptized have any idea of God’s incredible plans for their children. And God has even greater plans for children being baptized than he did for John the Baptist! After Jesus said in the Gospel that John is the greatest born of woman, he added, “but the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he” (Lk 7:28).

Each of us is consecrated by God in the womb of the Church (the baptismal font) to be not just his forerunner, but his son or daughter, and to live forever with him in his eternal kingdom of God. We may or may not become famous in this world, but God intends us all to be quite famous in the next. That’s his desired answer to the question parents in every generation ask about their children, “What will this child become?”

That’s God’s desire. That’s our calling and our mission. God will give us all the help he knows we need to achieve that destiny — which also includes Crosses! — but whether we achieve it or not depends on us. All of us have known young people who were enormously gifted academically, athletically or musically, but who wasted their talents and amount to very little in any of those areas.

The same thing happens with the spiritual talents and gifts God gives us. Some of us develop them fully; some of us waste them. Even though John was filled with the Holy Spirit from before he was born, he still lived a life of great self-denial so that he would never deny God. He responded to his mission with fidelity and allowed God’s work to continue in him.

That’s what we are called to do with respect to our lives and to the lives of our children. What we become in response to our divine destiny is dependent on our choices, on whether we develop or waste the tremendous gifts and calling God gives each of us. Today’s celebration is meant to remind us that each of us is capable of the fidelity we see in John the Baptist if only we respond to God’s graces as he did!

The celebration of a birthday is a time for all of us to reflect on the meaning of life. This celebration of John the Baptist’s birth brings us to reflect not just on the meaning of his life, but the meaning of our own.

When Elizabeth said, “His name is John” and Zechariah wrote it on the tablet, they probably didn’t realize that one day that name would have a prefix. Little did our parents realize when they brought us to be baptized that God’s plan is for us one day to have that same prefix.

The same goes for every child parents bring to the font. All of us are meant to have our name preceded by the most glorious prefix possible: “saint.” But to be given that honor and induction into the eternal hall of fame, we must live up to the title, a word that means “holy.” We become holy on the day of our baptism and are called to live in that holiness in each of our choices, by living in constant communion with God and God’s will..

Today, John the Baptist on his birthday gives us a present, the gift of his intercession for us that we may be faithful to the mission God has given each of us from the womb, remain in holy communion with God, and collaborate with him to bring or help others maintain their holy communion with God.

And just like he did 2000 years ago, he points out to us the path to holiness by pointing us to Jesus in the Eucharist, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

As we prepare to receive Jesus now, we thank Him for the gift of our life and the gift of those we know and love. We ask Him for the help so that we, like John, might allow Him to increase in our lives and bring us to the eternal destiny for which we were born.

Entering the narrow gate...

photo owned by Iosif Solomon of Flickr

Today's Gospel (Mt 7:6.12-14):

Jesus said to his disciples, «Do not give what is holy to the dogs, or throw your pearls to the pigs: they might trample on them and even turn on you and tear you to pieces.

So, do to others whatever you would that others do to you: there you have the Law and the Prophets. Enter through the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many go that way.

How narrow is the gate that leads to life and how rough the road; few there are who find it.

Reflection

Today, Jesus makes us three important recommendations. We shall, however, pay attention to the last one: «Enter through the narrow gate» (Mt 7:13), in order to attain the plenitude of Life and be always happy, while avoiding going to perdition and be forever doomed.

If you look around you and around your own existence, you will easily verify that whatever is worthwhile is costly, and that all things having a certain level are subject to the Master's recommendation: as the Church Fathers have said with wisdom, «by way of the Cross all mysteries contributing to our salvation are fulfilled» (St. John Crysostom). In her deathbed, an elderly woman who had suffered much in her life, told me once: «Father, if you do not savour the Cross, you do not desire Heaven; if there is no Cross there is no Heaven».

All this contradicts our falling human nature, even though it has been redeemed. For this reason, in addition to facing up to our natural tendencies, we shall have to go against the tide because of our environmental upbeat founded on materialism and the uncontrolled relish of our senses, that —at the price of not-being— long for getting more and more each time, to be able to enjoy the maximum pleasure.

When we follow Jesus —who said «I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life» (Jn 8:12)—, we realize that the Gospel does not condemn us to a boring and unhappy life in darkness; on the contrary, it promises and gives us the true happiness.

We only have to review the Beatitudes and look at those who, having entered through the narrow gate, have been very happy and have made others happy too, while obtaining —for having believed in and waited for He who never let us down— the reward of self-denial: «Many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life» (Lk 18:30).

The Virgin's “yes” is accompanied by humility, poverty, the Cross, but also by the prize to fidelity and generous surrender.

how can these things happen?...

Today's Gospel (Mk 4:35-41):
One day when evening had come, Jesus said to them, «Let's go across to the other side». So they left the crowd and took him away in the boat he had been sitting in, and other boats set out with him.

Then a storm gathered and it began to blow a gale. The waves spilled over into the boat so that it was soon filled with water. And Jesus was in the stern, asleep on the cushion.

They woke him up and said, «Master, don't you care if we sink?». As Jesus awoke, he rebuked the wind and ordered the sea, «Quiet now! Be still!».

The wind dropped and there was a great calm. Then Jesus said to them, «Why are you so frightened? Do you still have no faith?». But they were terrified and they said to one another, «Who can this be? Even the wind and the sea obey him!».

Reflection

Today —in these days of «stormy weather»— we find the Gospel being held up to questioning. Humanity has gone through dramas which, like violent waves, have broken over individuals and entire peoples, particularly during the 20th century and the troubles of the 21st.

Sometimes we can't help but ask «Master, don't you care if we sink?» (Mk 4,38); If You really do exist, if You are our Father, how can these things happen?

Before the horror of the memory of the concentration camps of the Second World War Pope Benedict asks «Where was God when this was happening, Why did He stay silent? How could He tolerate such excessive destruction?».

It was a question that the people of Israel asked in the Old Testament: «Why are you asleep? (…) Why do you hide your face from us and forget about our plight?».

God will not answer those questions: of Him we can ask everything except why; we have no right to demand explanations. In fact, God is there and is talking; the problem is us, because we do not put ourselves in His presence and therefore cannot hear His voice.

«We cannot decipher God's secret —says Pope Benedict XI—. We can only see fragments of it and are in the wrong if what we are trying is to become judges of God and History.

As such we would not be defending humanity, but rather would be contributing to its destruction».

Therefore, the problem is not whether God exists or is here with us or not. The problem is that we live as if He didn't exist. Here is God's answer: «Why are you so afraid? How can you not have faith?» (Mc 4,40).

This Jesus said that to His disciples; He also said it to Saint Faustina Kowalska: «My daughter, do not be afraid, I am always with you even when it looks as though I am not».

Let us not ask Him questions, but rather let us pray and accept His will and... then there will be less dramas, and, amazed, we will say «Who is He whom even the wind and the sea obey Him?» (Mc 4,41)

—Jesus, we put all our trust in you!

It is my body. This is my blood...

Mark 14:12-16,22-26 Corpus Christi [Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ] (alternate reading: Mark 4:26-34

12 And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the passover lamb, his disciples said to him, "Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the passover?"

13 And he sent two of his disciples, and said to them, "Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you; follow him, 14 and wherever he enters, say to the householder, `The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I am to eat the passover with my disciples?'

15 And he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready; there prepare for us." 16 And the disciples set out and went to the city, and found it as he had told them; and they prepared the passover. 22 And as they were eating, he took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them, and said, "Take; this is my body."

23 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. 24 And he said to them, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.

25 Truly, I say to you, I shall not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God." 26 And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Thoughts to ponder:

Why did Jesus offer himself as "food and drink"?

Jesus chose the time of Passover to fulfill what he had announced at Capernaum– giving his disciples his body and his blood (John 6:51-58). Jesus’ passing over to his Father by his death and resurrection, the new Passover, is anticipated in the Last Supper and celebrated in the Eucharist or Lord's Supper, which fulfills the Jewish Passover and anticipates the final Passover of the church in the glory of God’s kingdom.

This is the most significant meal of Jesus and the most important occasion of his breaking of bread. In this meal Jesus identifies the bread as his body and the cup as his blood. When the Lord Jesus commands his disciples to eat his flesh and drink his blood, he invites us to take his life into the very center of our being (John 6:53).

That life which he offers is the very life of God himself. Jesus' death on the cross, his gift of his body and blood in the Supper, and his promise to dine again with his disciples when the kingdom of God comes in all its fulness are inseparably linked.

Jesus instructed his disciples to "do this in remembrance of me". These words establish every Lord's Supper or Eucharist as a "remembrance" of Jesus' atoning death, his resurrection, and his promise to return again. "For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes" (1 Corinthians 11:26).

Our celebration of the Lord's Supper anticipates the final day when the Lord Jesus will feast anew with his disciples in the heavenly marriage feast of the Lamb and his Bride. Do you know the joy of the drinking Christ's cup and tasting the bread of his Table in sincerity?

Mark ties the last supper meal with Jesus' death and the coming of God's kingdom. Jesus transforms the passover of the old covenant into the meal of the "new covenant in my blood". In the Old Covenant bread and wine were offered in sacrifice as a sign of grateful acknowledgment to their Creator.

Melchizedek’s offering of bread and wine, who was both priest and king (Genesis 14:18), prefigured the offering made by Jesus, our high priest and king. The unleavened bread at Passover and the miraculous manna in the desert are the pledge of God's faithfulness to his promises.

The "cup of blessing" at the end of the Jewish passover meal points to the messianic expectation of the rebuilding of Jerusalem. Jesus gave a new and definitive meaning to the blessing of the bread and the cup when he instituted the "Lord's Supper" or "Eucharist".

He speaks of the presence of his body and blood in this new meal. When at the Last Supper Jesus described his blood “poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:28), he was explaining his coming crucifixion as a sacrifice for sins. His death on the cross fulfilled the sacrifice of the paschal lamb.

That is why John the Baptist called him the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” Jesus made himself an offering and sacrifice, a gift that was truly pleasing to the Father. He “offered himself without blemish to God” (Hebrews 9:14) and “gave himself as a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2). This meal was a memorial of his death and resurrection.

When we receive from the Lord’s table we unite ourselves to Jesus Christ, who makes us sharers in his body and blood. Ignatius of Antioch (35-107 A.D.) calls it the "one bread that provides the medicine of immortality, the antidote for death, and the food that makes us live for ever in Jesus Christ" (Ad Eph. 20,2).

This supernatural food is healing for both body and soul and strength for our journey heavenward. When you approach the Table of the Lord, what do you expect to receive? Healing, pardon, comfort, and rest for your soul? The Lord has much more for us, more than we can ask or imagine.

The principal fruit of receiving the Eucharist is an intimate union with Christ. As bodily nourishment restores lost strength, so the Eucharist strengthens us in charity and enables us to break with disordered attachments to creatures and to be more firmly rooted in the love of Christ. Do you hunger for the "bread of life"?