The baptism of Jesus! This was a huge event in his life. We have the
infancy stories and the account of his being lost when he was about
twelve years of age, and then silence for about eighteen years. What
was he doing? How did he spend his days? We don’t know. We assume
that he worked as a carpenter, that he studied the Sacred Scriptures
and became well-acquainted with the lives of ordinary working people.
That went on almost until he was around thirty years of age. And
then, this HUGE event, his baptism and the Holy Spirit coming upon
him and the voice from Heaven speaking. He had begun a whole new
career. He was now going about, a wandering preacher from one side of
the country to the other, announcing the good news of God’s love and
that God’s kingdom was at hand. HUGE change in his life, huge, complete.

You know how difficult change can be, from, let’s say, elementary
school to high school, then, perhaps, on to college, a job, maybe the
loss of a job; from being single to marriage, to having children, to
a new home; to growing old, to grieving the loss of a loved one, and
then moving on. These are all wrenching moments for us as human
beings, very difficult to deal with it. Makes big demands of us. How
did Jesus face this huge change in his life, from a relatively
comfortable easy, predictable life to a life lived on the edge? The
Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. How did he manage this
change? Not alone, and that, I think, is the really important thing
to remember. Not alone. The Father was with him, close by,
encouraging him, supporting him. He heard that wonderful voice
saying, “This is my beloved son, with whom I am well-pleased.” This
must have been a tremendous psychological lift for Jesus, to know
that the Father, his Father, God the Father approved of this new
direction in his life, this new vocation that he was taking up of
preaching the good news of God’s love.

What about us? What does our baptism mean for us? Most of us, I would
assume, were baptized as infants and certainly had no idea that this
was a big, dramatic moment in our lives. But, now, as adults if we
look at our baptism, if we think about our baptism, what does it mean
for us? Our parents committed us to the living out of the full,
Catholic, Christian life. That’s the commitment they made, and they
did their best to help us do that. Now, we have to take
responsibility as adults for our lives and for the commitment that
was made in our behalf. We have to try to respond to that in our
daily lives. If our baptism is to initiate change in us, and we
should be always open to that, to change and growth in our Christian
lives, if our baptism is to do that, we need help because baptism is
not magic! It’s not magic. We need help. We can be assured of having
the help of the Holy Spirit. Yes, the Holy Spirit will be upon us,
not perhaps in the form of a dove descending from Heaven, but in the
form of other people, family, friends, fellow parishoners who
encourage us and support us by giving us the good example of how a
Catholic, Christian life should be lived.

The support of a vibrant Christian community is so vital to our
growth as Christians. And, thanks be to God, that is what we have
here in this parish. And I want to thank you. I thank you for your
presence this morning. I thank you for the good example you are
giving me. It supports me and encourages me in my efforts to live the
commitment of my baptism. The full Christian life, to which our
parents committed us has to be nourished and developed through our
youth and lived out to its full in our adulthood. I’d like to really
commend the parents who, week after week, all of you parents and at
the different masses, week after week, bring your children with you
to Mass. You are not afraid to say to your children, “Look. We do
things as a family, and that includes going to Mass.” I commend you
and I thank you, and your children. We thank you too because you are
remembering the words that you heard when you brought your child to
be baptized, when the priest said, “In asking to have your child
baptised, you are accepting the responsibility to bring this child up
to keep God’s commandments by loving God and our neighbor. Do you
clearly understand what you are undertaking?” Momentous question! You
have clearly understood what you are undertaking. You have done your
very best to bring your children up to know and to love God and one
another.

A word to grandparents, many of you here today. Please do not, do not
press for the baptism of your grandchild if the parents are not
regular church-goers, not really living up to the commitment of their
baptism or, as we say in Ireland, if they are not “Gospel-greedy.” I
repeat what I said before. Baptism is not magic. It is not magic. And
you would just be asking parents to commit a child to a way of life
that they themselves do not value fully. And in my experience, it is
most unlikely that that commitment would be lived out. The best you
can do is not only to pray about it, but the example of your own
life, the example of your commitment, the example of how you deal
with other people, how you treat other people. This is one of the
most powerful things you can do, and then leave it to the good Lord.
He’ll work in his own way.

By the way, do you know the date of your baptism? .... Good! Mine was
January 18th, six days after I was born. I am told I was a small,
little, scrawny kid, and they were afraid I might die. So they rushed
me off and got me baptized. Seriously, the day of our baptism is
huge, just as it was in the life of Jesus! It marked a profound
change in his life, and it calls us to continuous assessment, to
continuous change and growth in our spiritual lives. We should
reflect on that. I invite you to do that today or sometime this week.
If you can, take a few minutes to just ask yourself, “What does my
baptism mean for me, the new life that I received, this baptism, the
new life of God, being a very special child of God, a brother, sister
of Jesus Christ, called to live out that life?” Huge, our baptisms!
Just the beginning of everything we are as Christians! And we embrace
it and we thank the Lord for that great grace and that great gift.
Let us then, as a community, support one another by our prayers and
by our lives as we each one of us just make our own best efforts to
live out the commitment of baptism because God says to each one of
us, “You are my beloved child with whom I am well pleased. ... Amen.