His Excellency,
The Most Reverend Edward K. Braxton, Ph.D., S.T.D.
Diocese of Belleville
The Baptism of the Lord
January 12, 2025
(This is the text as originally written. During the actual delivery, some passages were omitted and other comments were added spontaneously. Nota bene: This text has not been thoroughly proofread. Therefore, there may be errors in spelling, grammar and punctuation.)
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ,
The name “Father Joseph Mohr” is probably not familiar to you. In December 1816, Father Mohr, a young, Austrian Priest serving St. Nicholas Church in Oberndorf, went for a walk. Looking out over the quiet, winter-laden town, he composed a poem, “Stille Nacht.”
On Christmas Eve, 1818, the organ at St. Nicholas Church was not working. So, Franz Xaver Gruber, the choir director, quickly wrote a melody for Father Mohr’s poem. The Priest played the melody on his guitar and sang “Stille Nacht,” and the world heard “Silent Night” for the first time. The organ repair man took a copy of the hymn to his home village. It quickly spread across northern Europe. In 1839, the Rainer family sang the carol in the United States for the first time outside Trinity Church in New York City. The hymn is now sung in churches all over the world throughout the Christmas season until today’s Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, which brings an end to Christmastide.
“Silent night, holy night; all is calm, all is bright. ‘Round yon Virgin Mother and Child, Holy Infant, so tender and mild, sleep in heavenly peace, sleep in heavenly peace.”
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Today, somewhat abruptly, the Church turns our attention away from this Holy Infant and asks us to get Jesus out of the manger and into the world by turning our eyes to the adult Jesus, plunged into the waters of the Jordan river for His mysterious baptism by His kinsman John. St. Luke’s gospel uses this baptism story to announce the beginning of the public ministry of the adult Jesus. (With the exception of Luke’s account of the 12-year-old Jesus lost in the temple, the gospels tell us nothing about Jesus from His birth to His adult baptism.) Immediately after His baptism, Jesus is led into the desert to be tempted to sin by the Evil One. Thus, within days after meditating on the birth of Jesus, the Church anxiously gets Him out of the manger and into the world. This abrupt change of focus is to remind us that our lives of faith are not to be spent gazing at a Christmas card picture of Joseph, Mary, and the infant Jesus surrounded by shepherds, singing angels, and the magi. Today’s feast calls us to renew our baptismal commitments and live by Jesus’s law of love: Love God with our whole being and love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
Luke puts it this way: “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.’” It is fitting that at the start of a New Year, we are called to follow Jesus out of the life-giving waters of the Jordan river into the world and face the forces against life that surround us. On Wednesday, January 15th, we mark the 96th anniversary of the birth of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. When Reverend King was brutally murdered on April 4, 1968, Pope St. Paul VI said that he was like Christ Himself, an innocent lamb of God led to the slaughter in the service racial justice in the United States.
Next Wednesday, January 22nd, we mark the 52nd anniversary of the 1973 Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion as a constitutional right. The legalization of abortion has resulted in the destruction of the developing human lives of countless thousands in their mothers’ wombs and has led to fierce debates about the legality and the morality of the ruling. There were huge March for Life demonstrations seeking to overturn the court ruling and other demonstrations vehemently defending the Roe v. Wade decision, arguing that a mother’s right to privacy gives her the right to end developing life in the womb. Then, in June 2022, in the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade, declaring that this issue must be determined by each state, resulting in different, conflicting laws from state to state. The ongoing American quarrel concerning the legal, political, and ethical questions concerning abortion surely added to the fierce, conflicting voices in the recent presidential election.
For many Americans, including many Catholics, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is little more than a day off in January. But, for some Americans, it is truly a time to remember that the dream of Dr. King remains a dream deferred. Many people rededicate themselves to works of reconciliation in an effort to bridge the racial divide in the United States. Others argue that people should stop complaining about perceived injustices since the goals of the Civil Rights movement have all been achieved.
For many Americans, including many Catholics, the anniversary of Roe v. Wade and the anniversary of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization are a time to do all they can to support the culture of life. They volunteer at women’s shelters, they assist young women who are expecting a child in difficult circumstances, and they provide educational resources to others concerning the dignity and value of every human life. They work for the day when there will be no abortions in America. Others argue that such a day will never dawn, because the decision to have a child is the mother’s alone and others should not interfere.
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Paradoxically, there are large numbers of Americans who are devoted to the causes of freedom, equality, and justice for which Dr. King died who see no connection between their cause and the causes of those who are concerned about continuing to reduce the number of abortions in this country. And, conversely, many who rightly work to bring an end to the scourge of abortion seem indifferent to the Civil Rights movement and oblivious to the persistence of racial prejudice in the United States.
Pope Francis in his New Year’s Day message said, “All people must learn to protect the precious gift of human life in the womb and to care for every child born into this world. Catholics should make a firm commitment to respect the dignity of all human life from conception to natural death.”
Some Christians may think Father Joseph Mohr’s lyrics, “’Round yon Virgin Mother and Child, Holy Infant so tender and mild, sleep in heavenly peace” are an invitation to sit back and take it easy, comforted by the tender and mild Holy Infant inviting us to sleep, even though there is no heavenly peace. But today’s commemoration of Jesus’s baptism tells us the opposite. This baptism heralds the beginning of Jesus challenging public teachings. “Love your enemies.” “Be good to those who persecute you.” “Feed the hungry.” “Clothe the naked.” Today is a reminder that the most important New Year’s resolution for us to make is not “to exercise more,” or “to cut back on alcohol.” Our most important resolution is to examine the way we live our baptism into Christ’s Body each day.
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In recent days, we have all been reminded of the towering example of the humble Christian witness of a peanut farmer from Plaines, Georgia. No matter your political party, no matter your evaluation of his four years in the White House, no matter the unequaled Camp David peace accord between Egypt and Israel, no matter the 32 books on the Christian faith and public life, it is difficult to argue that James Earl Carter, Jr. did not commit himself to living out his Christian baptism every day of his singular life.
Though he spent four of his one hundred years in the White House, he considered the other ninety-two years to be more important, including his seventy-seven years of Christian marriage to his remarkable wife, Rosalynn. When asked why he served as a Deacon and taught Catechism classes at his local Baptist Church into his nineties, why he built homes for the homeless with his bare hands with Habitat for Humanity, why he forcefully opposed all forms of segregation and discrimination, why he had such deep respect for women and children, why he worked for the eradication of deadly diseases, why he challenged oppressive political systems around the world? He gave one reply: “I am a Christian. I am a baptized member of the Body of Jesus Christ!”
“I HAVE been a practicing Christian all my life. But God is not my personal valet. God does not build a protective fence around my life, keep me from trouble, fulfill my personal desires, or guarantee my success. However, through prayer, God offers me comfort, reassurance, satisfaction, courage, hope, and peace. God has given me one life and one chance to make it count for something. The something that I’ve chosen—is my faith. My faith demands that I do whatever I can, wherever I can, whenever I can, for as long as I can with whatever I have, to try to make a difference in the name of Jesus Christ.”
“Silent night, holy night; Son of God, love’s pure light. Radiant beams from Thy holy face, with the dawn of redeeming grace. Jesus, Lord, at Thy birth.”
Praised be Jesus Christ. Both Now and forever. AMEN!