#feast of the baptism of christ

[myremnantarmy]

"𝘠𝘰𝘶'𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘑𝘰𝘩𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘉𝘢𝘱𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵..."

[cruger2984]

THE DESCRIPTION OF THE FEAST OF THE LORD'S BAPTISM

When Jesus is about thirty years old, John the Baptist began preaching in the Judea desert, saying: 'Repent! For the kingdom of heaven is at hand!'

At that time, countless people were going out to him and were baptized in the River Jordan as they acknowledged their sins.

When he saw many of the Pharisees and the Sadducees coming to his baptism, he shouted: 'You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce good fruits as evidence of your repentance. I am baptizing you in water, for repentance, but the one who is coming after me will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.'

Then, Jesus came from Galilee to the River Jordan to be baptized. John tried to prevent him, saying: 'I need to be baptized by you, and yet you are coming to me?' But Jesus replied: 'Allow it now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.'

After Jesus was baptized, he came up from the water and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove and coming upon him. And a voice came from the heavens saying: 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.'

The baptism marked the beginning of Jesus' public ministry. We, Christians, should always remember our baptism, when we became the children of God, received the Holy Spirit, and were entrusted with the mission of preaching the Good News until the ends of the earth.

[cathotradi2]

On the feast of Theophany (baptism of Christ) orthodox Christians plunge in the blessed water

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Veronica Giuliani

1660-1727

Feast day: July 9

Saint Veronica, an Italian Capuchin Poor Clare, whose baptismal name was Ursula, is one of the greatest mystics in the Church. Her life was one of the cross and pain, uniting her sufferings with Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection, eventually receiving the stigmata. In her Diary of 22,000 pages, we learn of her ecstatic visions of Jesus, saints, souls in purgatory and of the devil. St. Veronica was devoted to the Eucharist and Sacred Heart, trusting God totally, abandoning herself completely to His will. Her heart is incorrupt to this day.

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase here: (website)

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

12th January >> Fr. Martin's Homilies/Reflections on Today's Mass Readings for the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. (Inc. Luke 3:15-16, 21-22): ‘Heaven opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him’.

Feast of the Baptism of the Lord (C)

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Luke 3:15-16,21-22 'Someone is coming who will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire'.

A feeling of expectancy had grown among the people, who were beginning to think that John might be the Christ, so John declared before them all, ‘I baptise you with water, but someone is coming, someone who is more powerful than I am, and I am not fit to undo the strap of his sandals; he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire. Now when all the people had been baptised and while Jesus after his own baptism was at prayer, heaven opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily shape, like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; my favour rests on you.’

Gospel (GB) Luke 3:15-16, 21-22 ‘When Jesus had been baptised and was praying, the heavens were opened.’

At that time: As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ, John answered them all, saying, ‘I baptise you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire.’ Now when all the people were baptised by John the Baptist and when Jesus also had been baptised and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.’

Gospel (USA) Luke 3:15–16, 21–22 When Jesus had been baptized and was praying, heaven was opened.

The people were filled with expectation, and all were asking in their hearts whether John might be the Christ. John answered them all, saying, “I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than I is coming. I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” 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.”

Homilies (7)

(i) The Feast of The Baptism of the Lord

We have just been celebrating the season of Christmas with its focus on the birth and childhood of Jesus, the beginning of Jesus’ earthly life. Today we are celebrating the beginning of his adult ministry. The child who had to be cared for in Nazareth has now left his home to set out on his public ministry, and he heads to the riven Jordan to be baptized by John the Baptist.

Why did Jesus enter the river Jordan with the large crowds who came from all over to be baptized by this strange prophetic figure? Jesus was showing solidarity with God’s sinful people right at the beginning of his ministry. He had no need of John’s baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins because he was without sin. Yet, just as he would later eat with tax collectors and sinners, just as he would be crucified between two sinners, so now right at the beginning of his ministry he enters the waters of Jordan with sinners. Jesus lived, died and rose from the dead for sinners, for all of us who struggle ‘to give up everything that does not lead to God’, in the words of our second reading. He journeys with us, not to condemn us but to empower us to live as he lived. John the Baptist declares that Jesus would baptize us with the Holy Spirit and with fire. This was a more powerful form of baptism than John’s baptism with water. Jesus walks with us to immerse us in the life of his Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God’s love. He journeys with us to ignite a divine fire deep within our hearts, the fire of God’s love. I am very fond of that prayer, ‘Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful, and kindle in us the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and we shall be created and you shall renew the face of the earth’. I try to teach that prayer to the confirmation candidates whose classes I visit during the school year.

The first time the Lord immersed us in the life of his Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and kindled in us the fire of the Spirit’s love was on the day of our baptism. Just as the day of Jesus’ baptism was a new beginning for him, so the day of our baptism was a beginning for us, the day when we began our lives as members of the Lord’s family, the church, when we became temples of the Holy Spirit, and, in the power of the Spirit, became sons and daughters of God and brothers and sisters of Jesus and of all the baptized. As Saint Paul says, with reference to baptism, ‘God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba, Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son and daughter’. The same Spirit who came down upon Jesus at his baptism came down upon us all on the day of our baptism. God who said to Jesus at his baptism, ‘You are my Son, the beloved, my favour rests on you’, says to each one of us on the day of our baptism, ‘You are my son, my daughter, my favour rests on you’. God’s favour that rested on us on the day of our baptism never leaves us. We remain God’s beloved sons and daughters throughout our lives, regardless of what we have done or failed to do. The divine fire that was kindled within us on the day of our baptism never goes out. It may die back, waiting for the breath of the Spirit to fan it into a living flame. The Spirit of God’s love stands ready to breathe afresh upon us whenever we open ourselves up to God in our poverty and need. Just as the Holy Spirit empowered Jesus for his future mission, so God breathes the Spirit afresh upon us to empower us to share in the mission of Jesus, which is the mission to bring God’s love into the world through all we say, do and think.

Because God never withdraws his favour from us, because we remain sons and daughters of God, because the divine fire that has been kindled within us never fully dies away, we can say not just, ‘I was baptised’ but ‘I am baptized’. We never lose our baptismal identity, and our baptismal call remains the deepest truth of our life. Yes, we struggle to live that call at times, but the Lord into whom we have been baptized, with whom we clothed ourselves at our baptism, never ceases to call us to live lives that in some way reflect the inspiring image of the gentle, sensitive, shepherd in the first reading, gathering and leading the weak and frail. Every day is an opportunity to renew our baptism, to open ourselves afresh to the coming of the Spirit. In the gospel reading, it was while Jesus was at prayer that the Holy Spirit descended upon him. Our own prayer can be a moment when the thin space between heaven and earth opens up and we become empowered afresh with the Spirit from on high.

And/Or

(ii) Feast of the Baptism of the Lord

I have a tin box in the house where I keep important documents. I was going through it the other day and I came across my baptismal certificate. Like many a Dublin baby I was baptized in the St. Andrew’s, Westland Row, just around the corner from Holles Street hospital where I was born. I noticed that I was baptized five days after I was born, which was the norm in those days. I had never really paid any attention to the date of my baptism before. If you had asked me the date of it a week ago I could not have told you. I made a mental note of my baptism date when I looked at the baptismal cert and I entered it into my diary. It occurred to me that I might pay a visit to St. Andrew’s church when my baptism day comes around this year, and just prayerfully call that day to mind there.

Our birth day is a day that gets remembered every year. There is something to be said for giving our baptism day a remembrance also. The early Christians paid at least as much attention to the day of Jesus’ baptism as they did to the day of his birth. Two of our four gospels, Mark and John, begin their story of Jesus’ life with his baptism. The other two, Matthew and Luke, begin with his birth. The baptism of Jesus stood out more for the first Christians than his birth. They recognized that the day of Jesus’ baptism was a kind of a watershed for him. It was the moment when he went public, the beginning of his public ministry. This was the day when Jesus began to make an impact. Such was the impact he made that it reverberated down the centuries and has resulted in our presence here this morning in this church.

If the first Christians remembered the day of Jesus’ baptism, they also remembered the day of their own baptism. They looked back on that day as a watershed in their own lives. They thought of their lives in terms of before and after baptism, in terms of who they used to be and who they had become through baptism. That consciousness of the difference baptism made comes through in some of Paul’s letters. Writing to the Corinthians he says, ‘this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God’. It is difficult for us to have that same sense of a time before and a time after baptism, because we were all so young when we were baptized. In my case, the time before baptism only amounted to five days. Yet, the significance of our baptism is no less than the significance of the baptism of the early Christians. The same sacrament was celebrated in our case as in theirs.

Indeed, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the day of our baptism was as significant a moment in our lives as the day of Jesus’ baptism was in his life. Our baptism day was the day when God said to us what was said to Jesus on his baptism day, ‘You are my son/my daughter, the beloved, my favour rests on you’. The same Holy Spirit who came down on Jesus on the day of his baptism came down on us. The second reading today speaks of the kindness and love of God who has so generously poured the Holy Spirit over us through Jesus Christ our saviour. If the baptism of Jesus was a more public event than his birth, likewise our baptism was a more public happening than our birth. Since the Second Vatican Council, the public nature of baptism has been more emphasized. We understand more clearly today that the baptism of a boy or a girl or of a man or a woman is not simply a private family event but a public church event. A child is born into a family, but is baptized into a church. That is why the notion of a private baptism is something of a contradiction in terms. When parents bring along a child for baptism, they are making a public statement, one which is of significance for the whole church, and, in particular, for the local church. At the very least, it is a source of encouragement to all of us in the family of faith to know that our family is growing, that we are receiving into our community a new member whose future living of the faith has the potential to benefit us all.

I have come to appreciate the day of my baptism much more in recent years. I have no doubt that it was a much more important day than my ordination day. Reflecting on the day of the Lord’s baptism can bring home to us the significance of the day of our own baptism. The baptism of Jesus set him on a journey that had consequences which no one at the time could have imagined. In a similar way, our own baptism launched us on a journey in the footsteps of Jesus, a journey towards the Father in the power of the Spirit. In the words of the second reading, our baptism commits us to give up everything that does not lead to God, and to have no ambition except to do good - to do what God wants. Every day we seek to be faithful to that baptismal commitment, trying to discern what path leads us to God and what one does not, and, then, taking the one that does. Baptism, properly understood, shapes us for life. When you get a chance, make a note of your baptism day. It is worth remembering it when it comes along.

And/Or

(iii) Feast of The Baptism of the Lord

Some of us may be able to look back over our lives and point to key moments that marked a significantly new phase on our life journey. It might be the day we met someone who went on to become a very important person in our life. It might be the time when we came to some place and we knew that this was the place we had been searching for over many years. It might be the moment when we took on some task that would become hugely significant in shaping the kind of person we would become. It might even be something we read that caused us to take a direction that would influence us for the rest of our lives.

If Jesus were to have looked back over his life, he would probably point to his baptism as such a watershed for him. Prior to his baptism he had lived a somewhat hidden life among his family and neighbours in Nazareth. After his baptism he set out on a very public mission that would take him far beyond Nazareth. This mission was to touch the lives of many of his contemporaries and of people all over the world in every succeeding generation. This mission would cost him not less than everything. Even though, according to today’s gospel reading, Jesus was already thirty years of age at the time of his baptism, and, in effect, coming to the end of his relatively short life, this moment of his baptism was a hugely significant new beginning for him. According to Luke, after his baptism, while he was at prayer, he experienced the coming of the Holy Spirit and a powerful assurance of God his Father’s favour, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved, my favour rests on you’. Graced in this way by the Holy Spirit and his Father’s word, he set out on the most important journey of his life.

Very few of us, looking back over our lives, would think of our baptism as a watershed. Most of us were baptized shortly after birth and we would find it difficult to think of a time in our lives before baptism. Yet, the fact that we were baptized so young does not make the day of our baptism any less important, any less of a watershed. On the day of our baptism, something happened to us that shaped us for the rest of our lives, even though we had no awareness of that at the time, and may not even have thought much about it ever since. Because of what happened on that day we can say of ourselves not only, ‘I was baptized’, but, ‘I am baptized’. What happened then shaped our identity for the remainder of our lives. We cannot really answer the question, ‘Who am I?’ without some reference to our baptism. Christ was baptized not because he needed to repent of anything but to identify fully with God’s people. He went down into the water with them. When we were baptized we were identifying ourselves with Christ, or our parents were doing that on our behalf. From that day on, our identity was indissolubly linked with Christ. We were baptized into him, sealed at the very core of our being with his Spirit. Something happened for us on the day of our baptism that marked us for life. To that extent, the day of our baptism, even though it happened for most of us at a very early age, was a true watershed.

We are living in a much more multi-cultural Ireland than even ten years ago. The likelihood is that as a country we will become even more multi-cultural in the years ahead. A growing number of people of other religions are coming to live among us. There is nothing to be lamented in this development. On the contrary, diversity, including religious diversity, has the potential to be very enriching for all. One of the ways that this new religious diversity can impact on us as Christians, as Roman Catholics, is that it can raise more sharply for us the question of our baptismal identity. As we meet more and more people who are not baptized, we may be prompted to explore more fully the meaning of our own baptism, to ask ourselves, ‘What does it mean for me to say: “I am baptized”’. When everyone else in our society was baptized, this was not a question we felt the need to ask.

To say ‘I am baptized’ is to make a statement that is rich in meaning. What our baptism means for us bears some relationship to what Jesus’ baptism meant for him. At our baptism, the Holy Spirit came down upon us, as it came down upon him. As Paul says in today’s second reading, God renewed us ‘with the Holy Spirit which he has so generously poured over us through Jesus Christ our saviour’. At our baptism God, our heavenly Father, said to us what was said to Jesus: ‘You are my son, my daughter, the beloved; my favour rests on you’. When we were baptized, we were privileged, like Jesus, with the gift of the Holy Spirit and the word of God’s favour. Alongside this grace of baptism went the call of baptism. Like Jesus, having been graced we are sent forth to live out of the grace we have received. Having been Christened we are to live Christ-like lives; having been baptized into Christ we are to allow Christ to live in and through us. The second reading speaks of this baptismal calling as giving up everything that does not lead to God and having no ambition except to do good. We spend our whole lives discerning, with the help of the Holy Spirit, what that means for each of us in the concrete circumstances of our own lives.

And/Or

(iv) Feast of The Baptism of the Lord

The baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist is represented at least twice in our parish church. It is to be found in mosaic form in the reconciliation chapel and in plaster form on the backdrop to the altar here. In a church dedicated to John the Baptist, it is not surprising to see that gospel scene more than once. There was something unusual about Jesus coming to John the Baptist for baptism. After all, John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, and those who came to him for baptism did so confessing their sins and looking for God’s forgiveness. Surely, Jesus had nothing to confess and was in no need of God’s forgiveness. Yet, he joined that throng of sinful humanity who made their way to John by the Jordan river. Jesus was standing in solidarity with all those who knew themselves to be sinners and were looking for God’s forgiveness. This would set the tone for Jesus’ ministry to follow. Having been baptized with sinners, he would go on to share table with them and would end up being crucified between two criminals.

In coming to John for baptism, Jesus was showing that he wanted to journey with us in all our brokenness and frailty, in all our proneness to failure and sin. We may be inclined to think that the Lord only has time for us if we first get our life in order. Nothing could be further from the truth. Jesus did not ask people to change for the better before he engaged with them. In engaging with them as they were and revealing what today’s second reading calls ‘the kindness and love of God’ to them, he hoped that they would be empowered to change. Jesus spoke of himself as the doctor who sought out the sick; he said he had come not to call the righteous but sinners. There are times in our lives when we might think that we have given the Lord good reason to distance himself from us. It is above all at those times that he is in solidarity with us, walking with us, just as he walked with all those who set out to submit to the baptism of John. We can find it hard to believe that this is how the Lord relates to us, perhaps because we tend to relate to one another rather differently. We often distance ourselves from those who have offended or hurt us. We pull back from those in whom we have invested ourselves but who have failed to live up to our expectations. This is often the human way, but as Isaiah the prophet says, the Lord’s ways are not our ways. The conclusion of today’s first reading captures the way of the Lord very graphically. He is like a ‘shepherd feeding his flock, gathering lambs in his arms, holding them against his breast’.

God showed his approval for this way of Jesus, for his walking in solidarity with all those who journeyed to John in the Jordan. At Jesus’ baptism, God’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit, descended upon him, and he heard God say to him, ‘You are my Son, the beloved, my favour rests on you’. Jesus was bathed in God’s favour at his baptism, and he was bathed in God’s favour so that he could be a channel of that favour to all people. Jesus would spend the whole of his public ministry bringing God’s favour to all who were open to receive it. He remains the channel of God’s favour to all of us here today. A privileged moment when we were the recipient’s of God’s favour through Jesus was the day of our baptism. Today’s second reading declares that the kindness and love of God was revealed to us through the cleansing water of rebirth, through the generous pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon us. In and through our baptism, God said to us, ‘You are my son, my daughter, the beloved; my favour rests on you’. On the day of our baptism, most of us would not have had any real awareness of that because we were infants. It is only as we get older that we can begin to appreciate the meaning of our baptism. It can take us a very long time to really hear and believe those words of God as spoken to me personally, ‘You are my beloved; my favour rests on you’. It is above all during those times in our lives when we are aware of ourselves as having failed and fallen short that we most need to hear those words as addressed to us.

Our baptism sets the tone for all of our lives. What God said to us on the day of our baptism, he says to us every day of our lives. That is why we say ‘I am baptized’, rather than ‘I was baptized’. Baptism gives us our identity as God’s beloved sons and daughters on whom God’s favour rests. That is why we are only baptized once, and then we spend our lives embracing our baptism and all it means. Jesus’ baptism was the beginning of his mission of revealing the kindness and love of God to all. That is our baptismal calling too. Like Jesus, we are called to share with others the favour of God which rests upon us.

And/Or

(v) Feast of the Baptism of the Lord

We gave something very special happening at Mass this Sunday that hasn’t happened in a very long time. Conor, a young adult, is about to be baptized and confirmed. He came to me asking for baptism some time ago. I asked Sister Bernadette if she would be willing to prepare him for Baptism, and they have been meeting together for many months now. I think I can say that their meetings have been a blessing for each of them. She is happy to present him as someone who is now ready for these sacraments. The feast of the Baptism of the Lord seems a very appropriate day for Conor to celebrate his baptism.

Today is a feast when we are all invited to reflect on our own baptism. Unlike Conor, most of us were baptized as children. We probably all know where we were baptized, if not the exact date. Like many a baby that was born in Holles Street hospital, Dublin, I was baptized in the adjoining church of Saint Andrew, Westland Row. On my way to or from the Train Station in Westland Row, I often pop into that lovely church and say a short prayer in thanksgiving for my own baptism. Unlike Conor, we didn’t have a say in our baptism. From the moment we were born, our parents wanted all that was good for us, and, for them, that meant the sacrament of baptism. They carried us to the font because they wanted us to belong to the Lord and his church as they did. Receiving baptism as a baby brings home to us that baptism is a gift. At that young age, we had done nothing to deserve baptism. Saint John in his first letter says ‘God loved us first’. Before we had learnt to love God, God demonstrated his love for us. ‘The kindness and love of God our saviour… were revealed’ in the words of today’s first reading. Just as we began our human life loved by our parents, we began our faith life loved by God. In a similar way, Jesus in today’s gospel reading begins his public ministry loved by God. In a prayerful moment after his baptism, Jesus heard God his Father say to him, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved, my favour rests on you’. Jesus not only heard that word of love from God, but God send the Spirit of his love down upon Jesus. ‘The Holy Spirit descended on Jesus in bodily shape’, in the words of the gospel reading. Jesus’ baptism was the sacrament of God’s loving presence to him as he began his public ministry. Our own baptism, Conor’s baptism, is the sacrament of God’s loving presence to us. The special place Jesus holds in God’s affection is extended to us all at baptism. At the moment of our baptism, God said to each of us, ‘You are my son, my daughter, the beloved; my favour rests on you’, and God, having spoken his word of love to us then poured the Spirit of his love into our hearts. For those of us who were baptized as infants, it was a wonderful way to begin our lives as human beings. We were greatly blessed by God before we had done anything to deserve such a blessing. God has never taken back his word of love or his Spirit of love from us. The word he spoke to us at our baptism, he speaks to us every day, and the Spirit he poured into our lives at baptism remains within us. Our baptism is not just a past event; it is an ever present reality. That is why we can say, ‘I am baptized’ and not just ‘I was baptized’.

If our baptism as infants highlights God’s gracious initiative towards us, Conor’s baptism as an adult reveals another dimension of our baptism. At a certain moment in his adult life, Conor, began to think about becoming a follower of the Lord. He then made his own decision to take the path of becoming the Lord’s disciple by asking for baptism. That decision was a response to the Lord’s call, a call which undoubtedly came to him through others. In responding to that call, in making that decision, he was going against the cultural tide, which is why his decision, his personal request for baptism, is such an encouragement to us all. Conor’s coming to baptism as an adult reminds us that baptism remains an adult sacrament for all of us, even if we were baptized as children. We have to keep making our own adult decision to live our baptism, to enter more fully into our baptismal calling. That too will often involve us going against the cultural tide. Baptism is a very adult sacrament. When Jesus was baptized, he was not only bathed in God’s love but he was sent out by God on mission to communicate God’s love to all, especially the unloved. At our own baptism, we were incorporated into that same mission of Jesus but, obviously, we can only give expression to that missionary dimension of baptism as adults. The occasion of Conor’s baptism is an opportunity for each of us to open ourselves afresh to receiving God’s unconditional love and committing ourselves anew to being channels of this love to all we meet.

And/Or

(vi) Feast of The Baptism of the Lord

We speak a lot about the weather in Ireland, especially when we are short of something else to say. I had a great interest in Meteorology as a teenager and if I had not gone on for the priesthood I would love to have been a Meteorologist. One of my great thrills as a teenager was getting a tour of the met office, which at the time was in a building on Upper O’Connel Street. If anyone out there works in the met office in Glasnevin, I would love to get a tour of that too. I remember the meteorologist giving me the tour said to me that Ireland doesn’t really have a climate. It just has weather. Maybe that is why we talk about our weather so much. Much of our weather comes in the form of rain, and we have various ways of referring to rain. We speak about raining cats and dogs. We also speak of the heavens opening. I like that second expression.

We find it in today’s gospel reading. It says that ‘when all the people had been baptized and while Jesus after his own baptism was at prayer, heaven opened’. The reference isn’t of course to a torrential shower of rain. It was Luke the evangelist’s way of saying that, at the moment of Jesus’ baptism, the barrier between God and humanity dissolved. Something of heaven came to earth. The Spirit of God came down upon Jesus. Jesus heard God, his heavenly Father, speak to him, affirming him in his identity and in his future mission, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved, my favour rests on you’. According to Luke in today’s gospel reading, it was while Jesus was praying that the heaven opened for him, that the Spirit came down upon him and that God spoke to him in a very personal way. It was as if, at that prayerful moment, heaven was empowering Jesus for his earthly mission. Some three years later, it was while Jesus’ disciples were at prayer in an upper room on the Jewish feast of Pentecost that the Holy Spirit came down upon them, empowering them for their mission to be the Lord’s witnesses to the ends of the earth. Again, at that moment, the barrier between heaven and earth, between God and humanity was dissolved. The Spirit of God filled the disciples. This had such a transforming effect on them that those looking on thought they were filled with new wine.

There is a sense in which prayer opens heaven for us, as it did for Jesus at his baptism and for his disciples at Pentecost. Perhaps it would be truer to say that prayer opens us up to heaven. Prayer disposes us to being touched by the Lord who is always present to us. Prayer allows the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, who lives in us, to come more fully alive within us. Prayer can help to make us more aware that heaven is nearer to us than we think. When we pray, the thin boundary between God and humanity, between heaven and earth, begins to dissolve a little. We create an opening for Jesus to speak to us, as he spoke to Jesus after his baptism. When God spoke to Jesus, it was to confirm his identity as God’s beloved Son. When God speaks to us in prayer, it is always to confirm and strengthens our baptismal identity as sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters of Jesus, temples of the Holy Spirit, members of Christ’s body. When we open ourselves up to the Lord in prayer, our baptismal identity becomes more alive.

We retain our baptismal identity throughout our lives, which is why we can say, ‘I am baptized’ rather than just ‘I was baptized’. We are never re-baptized because our baptismal identity was given to us for life. Every day of our lives God addresses the same affirming words to us that God spoke to us at our baptism, ‘Your are my son, my daughter, the beloved; my favour rests on you’. The Holy Spirit whom God gave us at our baptism is given to us afresh every day. Most of us were baptized in the early weeks or months of life, but the grace of our baptism remains present to us day after day, regardless of where we are on our life journey. We never lose our baptismal identity fully, because God never takes back the words he spoke at our baptism or the gift of the Spirit he gave at our baptism. Yes, we don’t always live out of our baptismal identity fully. We don’t always respond to our baptismal calling to allow the Lord to live in and through us. However, we can always renew our baptismal identity and we can always keep setting out anew in response to our baptismal calling. Immediately after his baptism, Jesus’ own identity as the beloved Son of God was put to the test in the wilderness. Our baptismal identity and calling will also be put to the test, many times. Yet, at such testing moments, we can be assured of the Lord’s ‘coming with power’, in the words of today’s first reading. As we become prayerfully present to the Lord’s coming, the Spirit of our baptism will become more alive in us, and the flame of our baptismal faith will be fanned anew.

And/Or

(vii) Feast of the Baptism of the Lord

I came across my baptismal certificate a little while ago. Like many a Dublin baby I was baptized in the St. Andrew’s, Westland Row, just around the corner from Holles Street hospital where I was born. I noticed that I was baptized five days after I was born, which was the norm in those days. I had never really paid any attention to the date of my baptism before but I made a mental note of my baptism date when I looked at the baptismal certificate. Hopefully our birth day is a day that gets remembered every year by someone. There is a value in each of us remembering our own baptism day when it comes around each year.

It seems that the day of Jesus’ baptism was of greater significance for the very early Christians than even the day of his birth. They recognized that the day of Jesus’ baptism was a kind of a watershed for him. It was the moment when he began his public ministry. This was the day when Jesus began to make an impact. Such was the impact he made that it reverberated down the centuries and has resulted in our presence here this morning in this church. If the first Christians remembered the day of Jesus’ baptism, they were very aware of the day of their own baptism. They looked back on that day as a watershed in their own lives. They thought of their lives in terms of before and after baptism, the person they used to be and the person they had become through baptism. It is difficult for us to have that same sense of a time before and a time after baptism, because we were all baptized as babies. Yet, the significance of our baptism is no less than the significance of the baptism of the early Christians.

Indeed, it would be said that the day of our baptism was as important a day for us as the day of Jesus’ baptism was for him. Our baptism day was the day when God said to us what was said to Jesus on his baptism day, ‘You are my son/my daughter, the beloved, my favour rests on you’. The special place that Jesus holds in God’s heart was extended to each of us on the day of our baptism. The Holy Spirit who came down on Jesus on the day of his baptism came down on us. The second reading today speaks of the kindness and love of God who has so generously poured the Holy Spirit over us through Jesus Christ our saviour. If the baptism of Jesus was a more public event than his birth, likewise our baptism was a more public happening than our birth. A baptism is not simply a private family event. It is very much a public church event. A child is born into a family, but is baptized into a church, a community of believers. When parents bring along a child for baptism, they are making a public statement, one which is of significance for the whole church, and, in particular, for the local church. It is a source of encouragement to all of us in the family of believers to know that our family is growing, that we are receiving into our community, a new member whose future living of the faith has the potential to benefit us all.

Reflecting on the day of the Lord’s baptism can bring home to us the significance of the day of our own baptism. The baptism of Jesus set him on a journey that had consequences which no one at the time could have imagined. In a similar way, the day of our baptism launched us on a shared journey in the footsteps of Jesus, a journey towards the Father in the power of the Spirit. Because of our baptism we are the church, the body of Christ in the world. Our baptism calls us to represent Jesus for the rest of our lives, to be his presence to others, to serve others in the way he did. That call of our baptism never leaves us, even when we neglect to pay attention to it. It is there every day of our lives. That calling represents the deepest truth of our lives because it flows from our baptismal identity which endures into eternity. Baptism is intended to shape us for life. The other sacraments are given to us as moments when we can renew our baptism and respond more fully to our baptismal calling. In the Sacrament of Reconciliation we acknowledge the ways that we have failed to live our baptism and open ourselves afresh to the Lord’s gift of his Spirit. In the Eucharist we gather together to publicly proclaim our baptismal identity and be nourished and sustained on our baptismal journey by the word of the Lord and the Lord’s body and blood. Today is a good day to celebrate our baptism and also to give thanks for our parents, whose faith carried us to the baptismal font.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

SAINT OF THE DAY (December 7)

Today, the Catholic Church celebrates the memory of St. Ambrose, the brilliant Bishop of Milan who influenced St. Augustine's conversion and was named a Doctor of the Church.

Like Augustine himself, the older Ambrose, born around 340, was a highly educated man who sought to harmonize Greek and Roman intellectual culture with the Catholic faith.

Trained in literature, law and rhetoric, he eventually became the governor of Liguria and Emilia, with headquarters at Milan.

He manifested his intellectual gifts in defense of Christian doctrine even before his baptism.

While Ambrose was serving as governor, a bishop named Auxentius was leading the diocese.

Although he was an excellent public speaker with a forceful personality, Auxentius also followed the heresy of Arius, which denied the divinity of Christ.

Although the Council of Nicaea had reasserted the traditional teaching on Jesus' deity, many educated members of the Church – including, at one time, a majority of the world's bishops – looked to Arianism as a more sophisticated and cosmopolitan version of Christianity.

Bishop Auxentius became notorious for forcing clergy throughout the region to accept Arian creeds.

At the time of Auxentius' death, Ambrose had not yet even been baptized.

But his deep understanding and love of the traditional faith were already clear to the faithful of Milan.

They considered him the most logical choice to succeed Auxentius, even though he was still just a catechumen.

With the help of Emperor Valentinan II, who ruled the Western Roman Empire at the time, a mob of Milanese Catholics virtually forced Ambrose to become their bishop against his own will.

Eight days after his baptism, Ambrose received episcopal consecration on 7 December 374. The date would eventually become his liturgical feast.

Bishop Ambrose did not disappoint those who had clamored for his appointment and consecration.

He began his ministry by giving everything he owned to the poor and to the Church.

He looked to the writings of Greek theologians like St. Basil for help in explaining the Church's traditional teachings to the people during times of doctrinal confusion.

Like the fathers of the Eastern Church, Ambrose drew from the intellectual reserves of pre-Christian philosophy and literature to make the faith more comprehensible to his hearers.

This harmony of faith with other sources of knowledge served to attract, among others, the young professor Aurelius Augustinus – a man Ambrose taught and baptized, whom history knows as St. Augustine of Hippo.

Ambrose himself lived simply, wrote prolifically, and celebrated Mass each day.

He found time to counsel an amazing range of public officials, pagan inquirers, confused Catholics, and penitent sinners.

His popularity, in fact, served to keep at bay those who would have preferred to force him from the diocese, including the Western Empress Justina and a group of her advisers, who sought to rid the West of adherence to the Nicene Creed, pushing instead for strict Arianism.

Ambrose heroically refused her attempts to impose heretical bishops in Italy, along with her efforts to seize churches in the name of Arianism.

Ambrose also displayed remarkable courage when he publicly denied communion to the Emperor Theodosius, who had ordered the massacre of 7,000 citizens in Thessalonica leading to his excommunication by Ambrose.

The chastened emperor took Ambrose's rebuke to heart, publicly repenting of the massacre and doing penance for the murders.

“Nor was there afterwards a day on which he did not grieve for his mistake,” Ambrose himself noted when he spoke at the emperor's funeral.

The rebuke spurred a profound change in Emperor Theodosius. He reconciled himself with the Church and the bishop, who attended to the emperor on his deathbed.

St. Ambrose died in 397.

His 23 years of diligent service had turned a deeply troubled diocese into an exemplary outpost for the faith.

His writings remained an important point of reference for the Church, well into the medieval era and beyond.

St. Ambrose has been named one of the “Holy Fathers of the Church, whose teaching all bishops should in every way follow.”

[orthodoxadventure]

Is it necessary to explain that Easter is much more than one of the feasts, more than a year commemoration of a past event? Anyone who has, be it only once, taken part in that night which is "brighter than the day," who has tasted of that unique joy, knows it. But what is that joy about? Why can we sing, as we do during the Paschal liturgy: "today are all things filled with light, heaven and earth and places under the earth"? In what sense do we celebrate, as we claim we do, "the death of Death, the annihilation of Hell, the beginning of a new and everlasting life..."? To all these questions, the answer is: the new life which almost two thousand years ago shone forth from the grave, has been given to us, to all those who believe in Christ. And it was given to us on the day of our Baptism, in which, as St. Paul says, we "were buried with Christ. . . unto death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead we also may walk in newness of life" (Rom 6:4).

Thus on Easter we celebrate Christ's Resurrection as something that happened and still happens to us. For each one of us received the gift of that new life and the power to accept it and to live by it. It is a gift which radically alters our attitude toward everything in this world, including death. It makes it possible for us joyfully to affirm: "Death is no more!" Oh, death is still there, to be sure, and we still face it and someday it will come and take us. But it is our whole faith that by His own death Christ changed the very nature of death, made it a passage -- a "passover, a "Pascha" -- into the Kingdom of God, transforming the tragedy of tragedies into the ultimate victory. "Trampling down death by death," He made us partakers of His Resurrection. This is why at the end of the Paschal Matins we say: "Christ is risen and life reigneth! Christ is risen and not one dead remains in the grave!"

--Rev Dr. Alexander Schmemann: Great Lent - Journey to Pascha

[apenitentialprayer]

May 11, 2023

Earlier today, Pope Francis declared that 21 Coptic Orthodox Christians, who were beheaded by Islamic militants in Libya in 2015, would be added to the Roman Martyrology. Francis made the announcement during an audience with Pope Tawadros II, the leader of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. The “21 Coptic New Martyrs of Libya,” as they are called, were martyred on February 15, 2015. Less than a week later, they were declared saints in the Coptic Orthodox Church by Pope Tawadros. The Copts celebrate their feast on the anniversary of their death, February 15, and it appears that this will also be their feast day on the Roman calendar.

The world was shocked in February 2015, when a 5-minute video was uploaded to the internet by ISIS militants. The video showed the 21 kidnapped men in orange jumpsuits being beheaded on a beach near the Libyan city of Sirte. 20 of these martyrs were Egyptian Copts who had gone to Libya to do construction work. The last member of the group, Matthew Ayariga, was a fellow worker from Ghana. It is said that he told the executioners, “Their God is my God. I will go with them.” There has been some question over whether he was already Christian or whether the witness of his 20 coworkers led to his conversion, but nevertheless, his Christian witness and solidarity are inspiring. It was reported that as they died, they chanted hymns and prayed aloud.

The deaths of these men as Christian martyrs is undeniable. The extraordinary photos of Blessed Miguel Pro, a Catholic priest who was executed by the Mexican government in 1927 during the Cristero War — taken just moments before the he was shot by the firing squad — are perhaps the only other photographic images recording a Christian martyrdom as it happened. And yet the recognition of the 21 martyrs as Catholic saints is unprecedented for several reasons.

The primary reason, of course, is that the Coptic Orthodox Church is not in full communion with Rome. The Copts are Oriental Orthodox (as opposed to Eastern Orthodox), because they split from the other Christian churches in the year 451 at the Council of Chalcedon due to differences over the nature of Christ. They are also referred to as “Non-Chalcedonian Orthodox Churches.” This means that they recognize the first three ecumenical councils, whereas the Eastern Orthodox recognize seven, and the Catholic Church recognizes 21 ecumenical councils.

After more than 15 centuries, our hope of reunion may seem remote. After all these years, the two Churches have independently developed their own traditions, theologies, forms of worship, and prayers. Yet some things have remained the same. Both Churches have maintained apostolic succession and the sacraments: Pope Francis is the successor of St. Peter and Pope Tawadros is the successor of St. Mark. In recent decades, the relationship between the Catholic Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church has become closer. For example, in 2017, Popes Francis and Tawadros made a joint statement indicating mutual acceptance of the validity of baptism in both Churches.

Pope Francis has praised the Martyrs of Libya many times, and today he recalled our shared baptism, as well as the blood of martyrs that enriches the Church. He said, “These martyrs were baptized not only in the water and Spirit, but also in blood, a blood that is the seed of unity for all of Christ’s followers.” In the past, the pope has discussed how we must realize that we, the baptized, have much more in common than what divides us. This shared recognition of sainthood between the two Churches is a significant step towards Christian unity.

This sets a new precedent. In 1964, when the Ugandan Martyrs were canonized by Pope Paul VI, St. Charles Lwanga and the other 21 Catholics among his companions were declared saints. The 23 Anglicans who were martyred alongside them were mentioned briefly in the pope’s homily, when he said, “And we do not wish to forget, the others who, belonging to the Anglican confession, met death for the name of Christ.”

Another reason why today’s announcement is unique was that Pope Francis did this by an official act. The Roman Martyrology is the official list of saints officially recognized by the Latin Church. Many Eastern Catholic Churches have their own processes for canonizing saints according to their traditions. Historically, when groups of Eastern Catholics have come into full communion with Rome, they will bring along their saints and prayers and traditions. Many of these saints aren’t officially canonized by Rome, and they are usually only venerated in their own tradition. By inscribing the names of these martyrs in the Roman Martyrology, Pope Francis has made it clear that these martyrs are to be venerated by Roman Catholics as saints.

Finally, in declaring them saints today, Pope Francis sidestepped the typical canonization process. They are saints, without having passed through the usual stages of Servant of God, Venerable, and Blessed. This “skipping” of steps is commonly referred to as “equipollent canonization.” Essentially, when a pope declares someone a saint by an official act, that person is recognized as a saint in the Church. This is not the first time Francis has moved a case along in this way. For example, when he canonized Popes John XXIII and John Paul II in 2014, he waived the requirement of a second miracle for John XXIII so that the two popes would be canonized on the same day. In 2013, he elevated the Jesuit Peter Faber, whose status had lingered at “Blessed” since 1872.

Perhaps the most interesting case is that of St. Gregory of Narek, an Armenian monk venerated as a saint in the Armenian Catholic Church and the Armenian Apostolic Church. Unexpectedly, Pope Francis named him the 36th Doctor of the Church in 2015. Living from in the mid-10th century through the early 11th, St. Gregory lived at a time when the Armenian Church was not in communion with Rome. After several failed attempts at reunion, the Armenian Catholic Church was officially recognized as an Eastern Catholic Church in 1742. Interestingly, the Armenian Catholic eparchy of Buenos Aires (established in 1989 by Pope John Paul II) is called the Eparchy of Saint Gregory of Narek. Perhaps this is how Pope Francis became familiar with the saint.

We Christians are blessed with a wide variety of saints from all sorts of backgrounds. They help make up the beautiful tapestry of the people of God — praying for us, interceding for us, and inspiring us. This is something worth celebrating.

21 Coptic New Martyrs of Libya, Pray for Us!

Mike Lewis. Bolded emphases added.

[orthodoxydaily]

SAINTS&READING: FRIDAY, JANUARY 10, 2025

december 28_january 10

THE 20,000 MARTYRS OF NICOMEDIA (302)

The Holy 20,000 Martyrs of Nicomedia: At the beginning of the fourth century, the emperor Maximian (284-305) ordered the destruction of Christian churches, burned service books, and deprived all Christians of the rights and privileges of citizenship. At this time, the bishop of the city of Nicomedia was Saint Cyril, who contributed to the spread of Christianity through his preaching and life so that many members of the emperor’s court were also secret Christians.

The pagan priestess Domna was living in the palace at that time. Providentially, she obtained a copy of the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles of Saint Paul. Her heart burned with the desire to learn more about the Christian teaching. With the help of a young Christian girl, Domna went secretly to Bishop Anthimus (Cyril’s successor) with her faithful servant, the eunuch Indes. Saint Anthimus catechized them, and both received holy Baptism.

Domna began to help the poor: she gave away her valuables with the assistance of Indes, and she also distributed food from the imperial kitchen. The chief eunuch, who was in charge of provisions for the imperial household, found out that Domna and Indes were not eating the food sent them from the emperor’s table. He had them beaten in order to find out why they did not partake of the food, but they remained silent. Another eunuch informed him that the saints were distributing all the emperor’s gifts to the poor. He locked them up in prison to exhaust them with hunger, but they received support from an angel and did not suffer. Saint Domna feigned insanity so she wouldn’t have to live among the pagans. Then she and Indes managed to leave the court, and she went to a women’s monastery. Abbess Agatha quickly dressed her in men’s clothing, cut her hair and sent her off from the monastery.

During this time the emperor returned from battle and ordered that a search be made for the former pagan priestess Domna. The soldiers sent for this purpose found the monastery and destroyed it. The sisters were thrown into prison, subjected to torture and abuse, but not one of them suffered defilement. Sent to a house of iniquity, Saint Theophila was able to preserve her virginity with the help of an angel of the Lord. The angel led her from the brothel and brought her to the cathedral.

At this time the emperor cleared the city square to offer sacrifice to the pagan gods. When they began sprinkling the crowd with the blood of the sacrificial animals, Christians started to leave the square. Seeing this, the emperor became enraged, but in the middle of his rantings a great thunderstorm sprang up. People fled in panic, and the emperor had to retreat to the palace for his own safety.

Later Maximian went to the church with soldiers and told them they could escape punishment if they renounced Christ. Otherwise, he promised to burn the church and those in it. The Christian presbyter Glycerius told him that Christians would never renounce their faith, even under the threat of torture. Hiding his anger, the emperor exited the church, and a short time later commanded the presbyter Glycerius be arrested for trial. The executioners tortured the martyr, who did not cease to pray and to call on the Name of the Lord. Unable to force Saint Glycerius stop confessing Christ, Maximian ordered him to be burned to death.

On the Feast of the Nativity of Christ in the year 302, when about 20,000 Christians had assembled at the cathedral in Nicomedia, the emperor sent a herald into the church. He told the Christians that soldiers were surrounding the building, and that anyone who wished to leave had to offer sacrifice to the pagan gods. Anyone who defied the emperor would perish when the soldiers set fire to the church. All those present refused to worship the idols.

As the pagans prepared to set fire to the church, Bishop Anthimus, baptized all the catechumens and communed everyone with the Holy Mysteries. All 20,000 of those praying died in the fire. Among them were the abbess Agatha and Saint Theophila who had been saved from the den of iniquity by a miracle. Bishop Anthimus, however, managed to escape the fire.

Maximian thought that he had exterminated all the Christians of Nicomedia. He soon learned that there were many more, and that they would confess their faith and were prepared to die for Christ. The emperor wondered how to deal with them. At his command they arrested the regimental commander Zeno, who was openly criticizing the emperor for his impiety and cruelty. Zeno was fiercely beaten and finally beheaded. They jailed the eunuch Indes, formerly a priest of the idols, for refusing to participate in a pagan festival.

The persecution against Christians continued. Dorotheus, Mardonius, Migdonius the deacon and others were thrown into prison. Bishop Anthimus encouraged them by sending letters to them. One of the messengers, the Deacon Theophilus, was captured. They subjected him to torture, trying to learn where the bishop was hiding. The holy martyr endured everything, while revealing nothing. Then they executed him and also those whom the bishop had addressed in his letter. Though they were executed in different ways, they all showed the same courage and received their crowns from God.

For weeks, Saint Domna concealed herself within a cave and sustained herself by eating plants. When she returned to the city, she wept for a long time at the ruins of the church, regretting that she was not found worthy to die with the others. That night she went to the sea shore. At that moment fishermen pulled the bodies of the martyrs Indes, Gorgonius and Peter from the water in their nets.

Saint Domna was still dressed in men’s clothing, and she helped the fishermen to draw in their nets. They left her the bodies of the martyrs. With reverence she looked after the holy relics and wept over them, especially over the body of her spiritual friend, the Martyr Indes.

After giving them an honorable burial, she did not depart from these graves so dear to her heart. She burned incense before them each day, sprinkling them with fragrant oils. When the emperor was told of an unknown youth who offered incense at the graves of executed Christians, he gave orders to behead the youth. Martyr Euthymius and Domna were also executed.

APOSTLE NICAMOR THE DEACON OF THE SEVENTY (34)

Saint Nicanor, Apostle of the Seventy, was among the first deacons in the Church of Christ.

In the Acts of the Holy Apostles (6: 1-6) it is said that the twelve Apostles chose seven men: Stephen, Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas and Nicholas, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, and established them to serve as deacons.

The Holy Church celebrates their memory together on July 28, although they died at various times and in various places.

Saint Nicanor suffered on that day when the holy Protomartyr Stephen and many other Christians were killed by stoning.

Source: Orthodox Church in America_ OCA

Romans 8:3-9

3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.

Luke 10:19-21

19 Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you. 20 Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven. 21 In that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight.

[bremser]

Robert Frank: Epiphany on the Rainbow Pier

In the previous post on "Covered Car – Long Beach," I looked at Robert Frank's contact sheet 537 to determine the exact location of one of the iconic photos in "The Americans." I was left wondering: Why did he drive down to Long Beach that day? Contact sheets 538-540 explain this.

The ostensible answer is Robert Frank was attending an Epiphany celebration (Feast of the Holy Theophany) of the Greek Orthodox Church, which featured a "benediction of the waters." The Epiphany celebrates the baptism of Christ by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. A wood cross is tossed into the water and young people dive in and swim after it, to see who can bring it back.

Long Beach's Rainbow Pier, since demolished

The "blessing of the water" event happened at the Rainbow Pier, adjacent to downtown Long Beach. The pier was so massive that it framed the municipal auditorium with room to spare; it was large enough that cars could drive along its loop. The waterfront area sputtered in the late 1960s and 70s, fell into disrepair and was re-developed. It was mostly filled in, today there's an outlet mall and a convention center arena, painted with the "largest mural in the world" by artist Wyland.

The Epiphany is a fixed date, January 6. In 1956, the Epiphany fell on a Friday, so this event probably happened on Sunday, January 8th. The chronology in the 2009 catalog puts Frank in Los Angeles for two months starting at the end of December, so this date fits. The church has moved locations in Long Beach in the intervening years, but this video on YouTube shows the same celebration happening in 2017 (the description says it's the 65th year, which indicates that it began in 1951).

This Long Beach work print feels a bit like one that made the final edit: "City Fathers -- Hoboken New Jersey"

Long Beach is an interesting case study in Frank's process: looking at the contact sheets, it doesn't seem like he made a single photograph of the priest tossing the cross in the water or the swimmers furiously chasing it. The one photograph that made the final edit, the "Covered Car", he discovered over a mile from the altar boys in swim trunks.

Robert Frank work print: "Automobiles -- Long Beach" it's possible, with water in the background, this was taken on the pier itself. 

An interesting comparison to Frank's photos from the Rainbow Pier are a handful of press photos taken at the same event two years later in 1958. (The USC archive identifies them as by "Emery," which may be Dave Emery, a journalist/photojournalist working in Long Beach.)

Los Angeles Examiner press photographs of "Blessing of Waters" off Rainbow Pier, Long Beach, 1958

Maybe Frank wasn't interested in this focus of action, the splashing, only the onlookers. The photojournalist shows 1950s people in the 1950s. Frank's Americans are in the 1950s, but viewed from the next era. In Japan, a photographer like Shōmei Tōmatsu was achieving the same effect: we see the Japanese of 1958, but the photographs look like they are taken from 1968. Both photographers slice open the 1950s social facade, while dispensing with the stylistic norms of photojournalism.

Shōmei Tōmatsu from "Chewing Gum and Chocolate", 1958

Spending time with his contact sheets, I'm left wondering: if Frank is able to find some of the best photos in the final edit by chance, why does he make such an effort to go to these events? Did he not realize this until he was finished the road trip? He could have picked a random neighborhood in Los Angeles closer to where he was staying. These Long Beach contact sheets, with work prints that recall photos from other parts of the country that made the final edit, hint at the extent to which Frank has pre-visualized what he wanted in "The Americans."

The contact sheet system relies on the photographer to keep the rolls and film strips in order. It doesn't seem like these "blessing of the water" photos and the "Covered Car" / Ocean Boulevard frames are actually chronological.

Long Beach work print, another example of a group of onlookers vs. the event itself.

Based on the date, exact location and the long shadows, Frank almost certainly took the "Covered Car" at end of the afternoon. Since the pier is long gone, I can't visit or look at Street View. Behind this photo of a group of men are two buildings that remain: the Ocean Center building (left) and the Breakers Hotel (center). There aren't obvious shadows, the sun is hitting the men and the buildings from the south, it's probably morning to mid-day.

There are four contact sheets related to Long Beach: 537-540. While it's possible Frank stayed overnight, I suspect the later contact sheets (538-540) were actually at the beginning of the day. I think the order of events is: 538, 539, 540, 537. The National Gallery of Art scans of these contact sheets aren't large enough to dive into the details of frames that aren't work prints, so it's difficult to look for clues.

How did Frank hear about the Epiphany on the Rainbow Pier? It takes a bit of imagination to consider a person's media diet from 1956. Looking at the local Long Beach paper in the weeks leading up to the event, there’s no mention of it. Was it in the Los Angeles Times or Examiner? The radio? Or did someone randomly tell Frank about it?

If you read the timeline of making “The Americans” and are familiar with what ended up as the final edit of the book, Frank often goes to an event that sounds interesting (opening night of a Hollywood movie, a parade, political convention or "blessing of the waters") and then ends up with photographs of people watching, instead of the event itself.

Frank shows up at a decisive moment and then turns 90 degrees. Examples from "The Americans":

at the Yale commencement, students in hats as the background, but the focus is one tired old man on a bench

at a political rally in Chicago, a photograph of a man holding a tuba, his face completely obscured.

at a Hollywood movie premiere, the actress is out of focus, the adoring crowd, in focus.

While it meant a lot of extra miles on the car, the strategy does make sense, he titled it "The Americans" not "American Events."

[cruger2984]

THE DESCRIPTION OF SAINT PAUL MIKI AND 26 COMPANIONS Feast Day: February 6

"I am not from the Philippines. I am a Japanese and a Jesuit Brother… Having arrived at this moment of my existence, I believe that no one of you thinks I want to hide the truth. That is why I have to declare to you that there is no other way of salvation than the one followed by Christians. Since this way teaches me to forgive my enemies and all who have offended me. I willingly forgive the king and all those who have desired my death. And I pray that they will obtain the desire of Christian baptism." -St. Paul Miki

The first martyr of Japan, Paul Miki was born to a wealthy Japanese family circa 1562 in Settsu, Osaka Prefecture in Kansai region. At a young age, he entered the Society of Jesus and preached the Gospel successfully.

The church had been implanted in Japan fifty years earlier, and counted over 200,000 Christians. In 1588, the Emperor claimed that he was 'God,' and ordered all Christian missionaries to leave the country within six months. Some of them obeyed, but Paul and many others remained secretly behind.

In 1597, Paul was discovered and arrested along with twenty-five companions. They endured tortures and derision through several towns, with their left ears cut off, before being taken to Nagasaki. After making their confession, they were fastened to their crosses, with iron collars around their necks.

Their valor and bravery were wonderful to behold. They gave thanks to God by singing Psalms 25 and repeating: 'Into your hands, Lord, I entrust my life.'

Standing in the noblest pulpit of the cross, Paul said to the people: 'I am a Japanese by birth, and a Jesuit by vocation. I am dying for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I do gladly pardon the Emperor, and all who have sought my death. I beg them to seek baptism and be Christians themselves.'

Then, four executioners unsheathed their spears and killed all of them in a short time. Their faces were serene, while they kept repeating: 'Jesus, Mary!'

On June 8, 1862, Pope Pius IX canonized him and his twenty-five companions.

[hieromonkcharbel]

From a sermon by Saint Peter Damian, bishop

Invincibly defended by the banner of the Cross

Dear brothers, our joy in today’s feast is heightened by our joy in the glory of Easter, just as the splendour of a precious jewel enhances the beauty of its gold setting.

Saint George was a man who abandoned one army for another: he gave up the rank of tribune to enlist as a soldier for Christ. Eager to encounter the enemy, he first stripped away his worldly wealth by giving all he had to the poor. Then, free and unencumbered, bearing the shield of faith, he plunged into the thick of the battle, an ardent soldier for Christ.

Clearly what he did serves to teach us a valuable lesson: if we are afraid to strip ourselves of our worldly possessions, then we are unfit to make a strong defence of the faith.

As for Saint George, he was consumed with the fire of the Holy Spirit. Armed with the invincible standard of the cross, he did battle with an evil king and acquitted himself so well that, in vanquishing the king, he overcame the prince of all wicked spirits, and encouraged other soldiers of Christ to perform brave deeds in his cause.

Of course, the supreme invisible arbiter was there, who sometimes permits evil men to prevail so that his will may be accomplished. And although he surrendered the body of his martyr into the hands of murderers, yet he continued to take care of his soul, which was supported by the unshakeable defence of its faith.

Dear brothers, let us not only admire the courage of this fighter in heaven’s army but follow his example. Let us be inspired to strive for the reward of heavenly glory, keeping in mind his example, so that we will not be swayed from our path, though the world seduce us with its smiles or try to terrify us with naked threats of its trials and tribulations.

We must now cleanse ourselves, as Saint Paul tells us, from all defilement of body and spirit, so that one day we too may deserve to enter that temple of blessedness to which we now aspire.

Anyone who wishes to offer himself to God in the tent of Christ, which is the Church, must first bathe in the spring of holy baptism; then he must put on the various garments of the virtues. As it says in the Scriptures: Let your priests be clothed in justice. He who is reborn in baptism is a new man. He may no longer wear the things that signify mortality. He has discarded the old self and must put on the new. He must live continually renewed in his commitment to a holy sojourn in this world.

Truly we must be cleansed of the stains of our past sins and be resplendent in the virtue of our new way of life. Then we can be confident of celebrating Easter worthily and of truly following the example of the blessed martyrs.

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28th July >> Mass Readings (USA)

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (B)

(Liturgical Colour: Green. Year: B(II))

First Reading 2 Kings 4:42–44 They shall eat and there shall be some left over.

A man came from Baal-shalishah bringing to Elisha, the man of God, twenty barley loaves made from the firstfruits, and fresh grain in the ear. Elisha said, “Give it to the people to eat.” But his servant objected, “How can I set this before a hundred people?” Elisha insisted, “Give it to the people to eat. For thus says the LORD, ‘They shall eat and there shall be some left over.’” And when they had eaten, there was some left over, as the LORD had said.

The Word of the Lord

R/ Thanks be to God.

Responsorial Psalm Psalm 145:10–11, 15–16, 17–18

R/ The hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs.

Let all your works give you thanks, O LORD, and let your faithful ones bless you. Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might.

R/ The hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs.

The eyes of all look hopefully to you, and you give them their food in due season; you open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

R/ The hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs.

The LORD is just in all his ways and holy in all his works. The LORD is near to all who call upon him, to all who call upon him in truth.

R/ The hand of the Lord feeds us; he answers all our needs.

Second Reading Ephesians 4:1–6 One body, one Lord, one faith, one baptism.

Brothers and sisters: I, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace: one body and one Spirit, as you were also called to the one hope of your call; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

The Word of the Lord

R/ Thanks be to God.

Gospel Acclamation Luke 7:16

Alleluia, alleluia. A great prophet has risen in our midst. God has visited his people. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel John 6:1–15 He distributed as much as they wanted to those who were reclining.

Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee. A large crowd followed him, because they saw the signs he was performing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. The Jewish feast of Passover was near. When Jesus raised his eyes and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, he said to Philip, “Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?” He said this to test him, because he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough for each of them to have a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?” Jesus said, “Have the people recline.” Now there was a great deal of grass in that place. So the men reclined, about five thousand in number. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were reclining, and also as much of the fish as they wanted. When they had had their fill, he said to his disciples, “Gather the fragments left over, so that nothing will be wasted.” So they collected them, and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves that had been more than they could eat. When the people saw the sign he had done, they said, “This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world.” Since Jesus knew that they were going to come and carry him off to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain alone.

The Gospel of the Lord

R/ Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Veronica Giuliani

1660-1727

Feast day: July 9

Saint Veronica, an Italian Capuchin Poor Clare, whose baptismal name was Ursula, is one of the greatest mystics in the Church. Her life was one of the cross and pain, uniting her sufferings with Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection, eventually receiving the stigmata. In her Diary of 22,000 pages, we learn of her ecstatic visions of Jesus, saints, souls in purgatory and of the devil. St. Veronica was devoted to the Eucharist and Sacred Heart, trusting God totally, abandoning herself completely to His will. Her heart is incorrupt to this day.

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase here: (website)

[catholicpriestmedia]

"The Feast of the Baptism of the Lord."

📷 Baptême du Christ par Saint-Jean-le-Baptiste. Eglise Saint-Pancrace. Yvoire. France / © Catherine Leblanc / #GettyImages. #Catholic_Priest #CatholicPriestMedia #BaptismoftheLord