2nd Ordinary Sunday - 20 Jan 2013

Isaiah 62:1-5; 1 Corinthians 12:4-11; John 2:1-12

In a poor Catholic village of South India a festive meal for the wedding was getting ready. It was the bride’s party that was playing host as per local customs. But when an unprecedented crowd turned up from the groom’s village, the bride’s family faced the horror of the food running short which would mean an insult to the groom and a bad omen for the wedding as well. While the wedding rituals were being performed, a few close relatives and neighbours of the bride’s family gathered to take a decision. Getting provisions from the town was impossible since it was too far. They could not think of letting down their most loved family in the village. Everyone got into the act and went round gathering rice, vegetables and provisions from each of their houses. They called it a miracle when they later discovered that they could serve their guests sumptuously and have enough and more food for themselves which tasted extraordinarily good, since love and generosity were the chief ingredients! It goes without saying that the meal was followed by fun, music, dancing, merriment and joy!

Today’s Readings from the Holy Scriptures reveal to us that the Lord God rejoices in the Church that has been instituted on earth by Jesus Christ in the Father through the Holy Spirit. There is the celebration of joy and at the same time the readings tell us about the gifts of God. God is generous to his children. The Gospel presents to us the first miracle performed by Jesus at a wedding. A wedding is a time of abundance and celebration. From the food and wine that are served, to the music and dancing that follow, weddings overflow with goodness of life. At a deeper level weddings speak about love, compassion and unity. Wedding feast Cana is a sign of God’s love and compassion. The abundance of the wedding is a taste of what God provides for us at the Eucharistic table.

The first reading gives us the celebration of Joy over the restoration of relationship between God and his people. Years of exile had made people realise their foolishness and now they consider it a privilege to serve the Lord God. God comes to them as a special gift. The reading begins with God breaking the long silence measured by years of exile following the collapse of the kingdom. The once proud and arrogant people are now ready to accept God’s plan for them. Israel is now given the royal status and the nation shines like the glorious crown, royal diadem in God’s hands. God honours Israel with the new name, my beloved, my espoused one. They are now God’s people. This wonderful transformation is not for the benefit of Israel alone. All the other nations shall benefit from it. They will see Jerusalem as the beacon of light leading them all out of the darkness.

In the second reading of today Paul enumerates the gratuitous gifts the Christian Community has received. The people of Corinth believed that whatever gift they had, including the spiritual, were due to their own merits. Paul says that diverse though these gifts are, they all come from the one God. All of us have our distinct abilities. We are called upon to use them to compliment one another, for the good of the whole community, for building up God’s Kingdom on earth. Paul lists nine gifts, but the charisms are not limited to nine. Christians receive whatever gifts necessary to fulfil their mission in life.

Today’s Reading from the Gospel of John reveals to us one of the events that came to pass to manifest to us that the promise of God the Father was being fulfilled in the fullness of time. In the Gospel we see Jesus, his mother and his disciples at a wedding. And it is not the religious ceremony but a wedding party. Jewish weddings of those days could last a week. This was a time of grand celebration and Jesus and Mary along with the disciples were part of it. The message today is very clear: Jesus brings joy and he shares in the joys of others. Religion is meant to be a joy-filled experience. The German philosopher Nietzsche once said: “If Christians want me to believe in their religion, they will have to look as if they are saved!” Christian joy is a sign of being fully alive. St. Irenaeus says “The glory of God is a person who is fully alive.” This is John’s gospel we are reading in which the theme is life: “I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.” Today’s story is indeed a great revelation of God’s presence and activity in our midst.

The action of Jesus turning water into wine is the first of the seven signs that Jesus performs and recorded in the Gospel of John. On the surface signs appear to be miracles but John presents them with a particular purpose. As signs these miracles have a strong symbolic significance that tells us about Jesus and also his messianic work. Each miracle reveals the messianic sign of Jesus the messiah who is the full revelation of God to us. He is word that has become flesh for the sake of humanity. John never speaks of these signs as Jesus’ ‘miracles’. He prefers to call them ‘signs’, pointing to God’s power and love at work in Jesus. Sign is generally a thing that points to or interprets a new idea or vision. In the wedding feast of Cana, the sign is that Jesus turns the water in six large stone jars used for Jewish purification rites, into very good wine. Jesus listens to Mary his Mother, performs the miracle for a poor family and saves the people from embarrassment.

We also find in the Gospel Jesus telling His mother that His hour has not yet come. It was indeed an unexpected crisis with the family having to run short of wine. This was to be an utterly awkward situation for the host. Mary on her own notices this and gets Jesus involved into the situation. She urges him to do something for them to avoid possible embarrassment. There is the indication that Mary was probably aware of her son’s power. It is also possible that she was sharing a human concern as she was a person as sensitive to the difficulties of others as we see at the visitation. Jesus responds to her in a divine way by giving them plenty of wine necessary for the banquet. The water, when poured out, turns out to be wine, not just ordinary wine but of the highest quality. This really, shocked the steward at the wedding feast. It is normal, he says, to serve a second-rate wine when people’s taste buds are blunted by much drinking. “But you have kept the best wine until now.”

Jesus accedes to his mother’s wishes but not just to prevent an embarrassing crisis. He uses this occasion to reveal something about himself. The water in the stone jars is changed into wine, and the miracle that Jesus does is not really visible. There is now enough wine to serve the people at the wedding banquet. Except for the servant and perhaps the disciples no one is aware of it. This wine symbolises the New Way that Jesus is introducing, far better than what had gone before. And there was so much of this new wine available and of excellent quality. It represents the generosity and liberality of God. “I have come that they may have life, life in abundance!” Abundance of wine was the Old Testament symbol of God’s salvation at the end of times. This is also a sign of the ultimate eternal messianic banquet. Jesus brings all to participate in the eternal banquet.

The miracle of today is to reveal a God in Jesus who is so generous that he sometimes scares us by his out pouring of love. His generosity is overwhelming and is often difficult for us to comprehend. And all this happens in the context of a wedding banquet. In the New Testament Church, the Christian community is the Bride of Christ. In the Letter to the Ephesians this “marriage” is linked to human marriage, of which it is a model. Jesus’ followers are called upon to experience his generosity and the Gospel of John tells us that they began to believe through the sign he performed in front of them. We see the power and majesty of Jesus. He performs the miracle for them and takes care of the chosen disciples. The Eucharist is a sign of God’s constant presence where he makes us generous with his love, and strengthens our love so that it can become our real paschal meal. Let us make every Sunday Eucharist a special meal to share with one another as Jesus did. Let it bring to us a sense of togetherness with those around us or strangers who happen to be present with us. Finally, we know that Mary was there present at the wedding of Cana. Her intervention saved the day. Her words to the servants are still highly meaningful for us: “Do whatever he tells you.” Mary here really represents the Church and it is through the Church that Christ comes into our lives and through the Church that we go to him. Let us reflect upon our active involvement in the Body of Christ and pray that by the grace of God, we may always persevere in our living faith as shining lights.