Monday, January 08, 2007

Baptism of our Lord: end of the Christmas season...


Yesterday, in the Diocese of Rome, was the Baptism of our Lord. Today, in the United States, is the Baptism of our Lord (the U.S. Bishops don't think that it is in our competence as laymen to deal with a holy day of obligation, Ephipahy, being on a Saturday?).

I took this photo of the Jordan River this past December. I tried not to get any of the Evangelicals in the photo who were along the shore. They were dressed in white, being baptized by immersion (ashamed was I by the immodest spirit of these Protestant modernists as their neophytes wore nothing but underwear and white dresses that were transparent once wet).

The liturgy proposes to us the narrative of Jesus' baptism in the Jordan, according to St. Luke's account (cf. 3:15-16.21-22). The Evangelist narrates that, while Jesus was at prayer, after having received baptism among the many who were attracted by the precursor's preaching, the heavens opened and the Holy Ghost descended upon him in the form of a dove. At that moment, a voice resounded from on high: "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:22). Jesus' baptism in the Jordan is recalled and highlighted, though in a different manner, by all the Evangelists. It formed part, in fact, of the apostolic preaching, as it constituted the starting point of a series of events and words on which the apostles were to give testimony (cf. Acts 1:21-22; 10:37-41).

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

the U.S. Bishops don't think that it is in our competence as laymen to deal with a holy day of obligation, Ephipahy, being on a Saturday?

Well, to be fair, the Epiphany has not been a holy day of obligation in the United States since at least the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884), so blame Cardinal Gibbons, not Cardinal Mahoney.