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January 4, 2022Abu Dhabi.
Below is the full text of Bishop Paul's homily for the Baptism of the Lord 2022.
Readings of the Day:
Isaiah 40,1-5.9-11; Titus 2,11-14;3,4-7; Luke 3,15-16.21-22
Sometimes we need to refresh our memory, especially when we are passing through a crisis. Then it can be very helpful to go back to the place where we had a primary good experience: A couple in difficulty may visit the place of their first kiss or the church where their marriage was blessed. As Christians we may go from time to time and see the place of our baptism. Going back to the venue where something important in our life happened, can be very touching and give us new dynamic.
The feast of the baptism of our Lord brings us back in spirit to the river Jordan where Jesus had a decisive life-experience. When he was baptized by John the Baptist, it happened that the sky opened above Jesus. The Spirit of God descended in the form of a dove from the open sky and hovered over Jesus and the water. That reminds us the first book of the Bible where at the beginning of the creation the Spirit hovered over the waters. In today’s gospel we hear the voice from heaven, saying to Jesus, “You are my beloved Son.” He is the new Adam who will overcome the fall of the first Adam. In Jesus the new Creation begins.
Our own Baptism was the moment when the heaven was also torn open, and the Spirit hovered over us. Over each of us the voice from heaven said: “You are my beloved child.” In Baptism we all have become adopted sons and daughters of God and therefore are brothers and sisters of Jesus and in Jesus. The baptism is the key to the understanding of the identity of Jesus. Equally, our own baptism is the key of understanding our own identity.
Listen again to the core of today’s gospel: “After all the people had been baptized and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, heaven was opened and the holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:21-22). If we continue to read Luke’s gospel, we discover that the Evangelist step by step reveals what this sonship implies. Being Son is realized in prayer (only Luke speaks so often about the prayer of Jesus). To be a child of God means also in our lives to live this relationship in prayer.
Jesus introduces his disciples and all of us into his confidentiality with the Father: “At that very moment he rejoiced (in) the Holy Spirit and said, "I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth... No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him" (Luke 10:21-22). In consequence, he teaches his disciples to address God as “Our Father” (Luke 11:2-4) and to join him in his mother tongue: “Abba, Father!”
Being the Son of God does not mean that Jesus was never put to the test. And it does not mean that we as children of God could escape the suffering. Remember Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane: “After withdrawing about a stone's throw from them and kneeling, he prayed, saying, "Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me; still, not my will but yours be done" (Luke 22:40-41).
To live as a child of God has the implication to live the love and the spirit of forgiveness as Jesus did: "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). Children of God are people with the spirit of reconciliation. As adopted children we have to surrender ourselves in the same confidence as Jesus did on the cross: “In a loud voice he cried out, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’; and when he had said this he breathed his last” (Luke 23:46).
Dear brothers and sisters, the feast of the baptism of our Lord invites us to renew our own baptism commitment. We need the courage to stand where Jesus stood, and the sky will again be torn open over us. We express our being as children of God in prayer (alone and in communion with others). When we come to our own garden of Gethsemane, we kneel with Jesus down and pray that we come in agreement with the will of the Father. We are called to love and pardon as Jesus did on the cross. Then we will be able to commend our spirit into the hands of the Father when the hour of our death comes. To follow Jesus requires endurance. For this he has given provision in the Holy Eucharist, which helps us not to give up but to keep pace with him – in good and in bad times. Amen.