I’ve decided to take advantage of the new lectionary and have read for you the optional readings set out for "liturgical year C." This preference reflects my predilection for that splendid reading from Isaiah that we usually hear only during Advent, but which is simply too beautiful for a once-a-year recital. And, especially in the light of Christmas, this reading takes on an even richer meaning. Here’s what I mean. When we’re in Advent and we hear God talking to Isaiah, telling him to bring words of comfort to the people of Jerusalem: "Give comfort to my people, says your God, speak tenderly; proclaim that her guilt is expiated" this is a comfort we are looking forward to in Advent. But, just having celebrated Christmas, we can now look back and say, (I hope we can say), ‘yes, Christmas was comforting; it was good; so many lovely things happened at the time of Jesus’ birthday. Thank God for it.’ And then, later, Isaiah predicts the coming of John the Baptist, "A voice cries out: prepare the way of the Lord! The glory of the Lord shall be revealed." And here again, this sounded very different with our ‘Advent ears’, but now, after Epiphany day, this "glory of God" has shone in the infant Jesus and "all people saw it" in the person of the three magi. Finally, in one more inspiring passage, Isaiah addresses the city of Jerusalem–as if it were a living person–and says to it, in effect: ‘point to yourself proudly and tell all other cities that God is to be found right here in the city of Jerusalem." No other statement of civic pride has ever been able to march that! Hearing that after Christmas, we see how the Church can say in a similar way: ‘look everybody! God-in-Jesus is found here in His holy Catholic Church: here is your God!’ As I said, this reading is too good to pass our way only in Advent; and we can now enjoy its ‘good news’ in a refreshing way after Christmas.

But, it’s really the second new scriptural offering–from the letter to Titus–that’s so especially welcome on this feast of our Lord’s baptism. It refers, as you remember hearing, not to the baptism of Christ, but to the very reason why Jesus himself was baptized: for our own baptismal good. Listen again these words from Saint Paul: "The grace of God has [now] appeared (we have seen this in the infant Jesus), and this grace trains us "to reject godless ways and worldly desires and to live temperately, justly, and devoutly." Those three words indicate for us how we, baptized children of God, should be living: temperately, justly, devoutly. ‘Temperately’ means that we impose a voluntary control on the amount we allow ourselves of material goods; that we curb what could easily become a wild craving for foods, drink, sexual pleasure, sleep, and all other material acquisitions: temperate living. ‘Justly’ means that baptized people ought to be honest (that is, truthful) and fair (in giving everyone what is rightly his). In a broad way, the word ‘justly’ describes someone who observes God’s commandments: a God-fearing man. Baptismal grace trains us (note Paul’s expression, "trains us") in God’s school of discipline, like an athlete being trained to coordinate his muscles and nervous system towards attaining a certain skill. And the final term Saint Paul employs is ‘devoutly.’ A Christian ought to be devout. There is a certain reverential way that marks Christian behavior. It’s not only that he bows his head and folds his hands in prayer (although it definitely includes that); it is also a broader attitude that permeates one’s whole character and separates him from haughtiness, sensuality, and, even, boorishness. Baptism has all the potentiality to make fallen human creatures, who might easily resemble beasts in their conduct, into rational, moral and courteous men and women (quite the opposite from what we are seeing ever more commonly in our brethren–and maybe in ourselves–who are nourished not on God’s grace but on the fluffy diet of worldly wisdom). And if you should think that being a Christian has nothing to do with this sort of planing or sanding off the rough edges of our selves, hear what follows / when Saint Paul describes the coming of Jesus: "the kindness and generous love of God our savior has appeared." Jesus, in other words, showed us the gentler side of God, thanks to which He had pity on us and saved us from landing in hell. And so, the idea that we ought to be people of a certain modified conduct, cultured (in the wide sense of the term), comes not from ourselves, but imitates what we have known and found in Jesus.

I think that on our Lord’s baptismal day He would be more honored not by merely calling to mind what happened to Him once long ago, but by our determination to use our own baptismal grace to straighten ourselves out. That ‘living temperately, justly and devoutly’ that Saint Paul wrote about simply has to take over and supplant the urgency of the flesh, the lure of material goods and the incessant whisperings of the devil. Left to our own resources, we couldn’t do it. But, remember, this is to be done by the grace of God, the grace we got in baptism.

I finish with one final and stirring phrase from that reading which seems to me an incentive to want to be as best I can, a real baptized Christian. Saint Paul writes: "we await..the appearance of the glory of our great God and savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to deliver us from all lawlessness and to cleanse for himself a people as his own, a people eager to do what is good.

I do have one more thing to say, more in the line of a commercial than the main fare. It concerns our posture at Mass, after the Offertory. I refer you to my article in the Grotto News today about this. It wont make any difference to you who attend the Latin solemn Mass, when we use incense, because you are already standing by the time the priest addresses you, "Pray, brethren [Orate, fratres]." But, surely there will be times when you will be assisting at Masses in English (or in Latin, without the use of incense) and so I want you to know that you should stand, when, after the priest has washed his hands, he turns around towards you. At that moment, and before he says, "Pray brethren" you should stand up so that his words will not be buried in the commotion of your standing. And in this way, we will fully conform to the requirements of the revised missal.