Do whatever He tells you.

 

With the celebration of the feast of the Baptism of the Lord last Sunday, we closed the liturgical season of Christmas.

 

But in   Puerto Rico, Christmas continues. The Fiesta de los Reyes, the Epiphany that is older than the celebration of Christmas, is celebrated here in grand style. It is a national holiday and children receive gifts on that day.

     In the town of Juana Díaz, in the south of the island about 15 km east of Ponce, this festival has been celebrated in a special way for more than 100 years.   

    The celebration, which is attended by thousands of people from all over the island, begins with a   field Mass in the town square, celebrated by the Bishop of Ponce.

 

     People from the village dress up to represent   the different figures of the nativity scene. The Holy Family occupies a central place in the scene. Shepherds, angels, animals, all are present.

   The Kings, who always prepare for the celebration with a spiritual retreat and who have gone on a cavalcade through different towns on the island, arrive at the portal and, prostrating themselves, worship the newborn…

 

     … Old San Juan and   all the towns are still decorated with Christmas motifs: the Nativity scene, the kings and Christmas trees.

 

    The tradition is not only to celebrate the octave of the Epiphany, but also the “Octavia” that is,   the Octave of the octave of the feast of the Epiphany.

     Celebrating holidays is one of the most deeply rooted customs and traditions not only in Puerto Rico but in all places where Spanish is spoken.

 

     In the Gospel for this coming Sunday we find Jesus, his disciples and   Mary, his mother, present at a wedding celebration.

 

     With his presence, Jesus not only manifests his blessing on the marriage union but also lets us know the holy dimension of the celebrations.

 

    There is a   saying in English, “Jesus is the reason for the season” which is intended to remind us of the reason for the celebration.

 

     How many of us are aware of the true meaning of the feast of the Nativity? How many of those who gathered in Juana Díaz to celebrate the Three Kings were aware of the holy dimension of the feast?   Certainly the beginning of the celebration with the Holy Mass and the Nativity scene served to remind us of this.

 

     In the Gospel of this coming Sunday, to which we have already referred, Jesus performs his first miracle at the request of his holy mother. She tells the wedding servers, “Do whatever He tells you.”

 

     Today Mary tells each one of us, “do whatever He tells you.”  

 

     If we always seek to do the will of the divine master, we will have reason to celebrate all year long.

 

The Knight of Our Lady.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alone?

 All I want is to be left alone!  What I would pay for some silence!  We seem to think we have this desire to be alone.  And there are many reasons for this.  We live in a very noisy and busy world.  It seems the time between the traffic light changing and the car honking behind us has been reduced to a millisecond.  Our phones are constantly drawing our attention.  God forbid, someone tries to actually ask us a question when we are looking at our phones, we are thrown for a loop..  We long to be alone.  We long not to be around anyone.  Or so we think.

Times of quiet and solitude are important.  I applaud those who have chosen a contemplative life of prayer.  We see what a great sacrifice that is.  Because while we enjoy silence, and while we enjoy solitude, we are not made for that.  We are made to be in relationship with others.  We are made to connect with others.  We are made for love.  How do we know this?  Well, we believe we are made in the image and likeness of God.  The image and likeness of God is not one of being alone.  It is one of being in community.

In the Book of Genesis, we see God referring to himself in the plural.  In Genesis 1:26,  God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”   For all time, God the Father  has been in communion with the other two persons of the Holy Trinity; the Son and the Holy Spirit.  The Father and the Son are always in being with one another, and the love between them is constant.  That love is the Holy Spirit.  The mystery of the Trinity is not just some challenge of faith, meant to be figured out.  It is rather a reality.  For indeed, God is love itself. If we are made in his image and likeness, we too must be in loving relationship with one another.  It is very simply how we are made to be.  And so while a culture of division and anger towards others often sadly seems normative, it is actually inhumane.  We are not meant to be that way.

As we witness the Baptism of the Lord, we have one of those few moments in Scripture when all three persons of the Trinity are presented.  The Father speaks, “You are my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  He is speaking to Jesus, the second person of the Holy Trinity.  The third person comes down in the form of a dove.  One God, but not a lonely God, a God of three persons.

When we are baptized, we are not meant to just be in a private relationship with God.  We are meant to share in that divine life, that communion of three persons, and bring that into the world - a world so in desperate need of love.

In this Jubilee Year of Hope, we can change. Perhaps tonight, we might want to wait for our family members to eat dinner together.  Perhaps, the next time we speak to the clerk in the grocery story we might ask how their day has been.  Perhaps the next time we are in Church, we can truly offer someone God’s peace.

We really do not want to be alone.  Made in God’s image, we cannot be alone

- The Servant