Pope: Homily for the feast of the Baptism of the Lord
(Vatican Radio) Pope Benedict XVI baptised 20 babies in the Sistine Chapel Sunday,
urging couples and godparents to lead their lives as an example of true Christian
virtue even though it may seem unfashionable.
In his homily for
this year’s celebration on the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord, the Pope said “It's
not always easy to openly and uncompromisingly show your beliefs, especially in the
context in which we live, in a society that often considers unfashionable those who
live out their faith in Jesus.”
Read the full text Vatican Radio’s
unofficial translation of his homily here:
Dear brothers and sisters!
The
joy arising from the celebration of Christmas finds its completion today in the Feast
of the Baptism of the Lord. To this joy is added another reason for those of us who
are gathered here: in the Sacrament of Baptism that will soon be administered to these
infants, the living and active presence of the Holy Spirit is manifested, enriching
the Church with new children, enlivening and making them grow, and we cannot help
but rejoice. I wish to extend a special greeting to you, dear parents and godparents,
who today bear witness to your faith by requesting Baptism for these children, because
they are regenerated to new life in Christ and become part of the community of believers.
The
Gospel account of Jesus' baptism, which we have heard today according to St Luke’s
account, shows the path of abasement and humility that the Son of God freely chose
in order to adhere to the plan of the Father, to be obedient to His loving will for
mankind in all things, even to the sacrifice on the Cross. Having reached adulthood,
Jesus begins His public ministry by going to the River Jordan to receive from John
the baptism of repentance and conversion. What happens may appear paradoxical to our
eyes. Does Jesus need repentance and conversion? Of course not. Yet He Who is without
sin is placed among the sinners to be baptized, to fulfil this act of repentance;
the Holy One of God joins those who recognize in themselves the need for forgiveness
and ask God for the gift of conversion – that is, the grace to turn to Him with their
whole heart, to be totally His. Jesus wills to put Himself on the side of sinners,
by being in solidarity with them, expressing the nearness of God. Jesus shows solidarity
with us, with our effort to convert, to leave behind our selfishness, to detach ourselves
from our sins, saying to us that if we accept Him into our lives, He is able to raise
us up and lead us the heights of God the Father. And this solidarity of Jesus is not,
so to speak, a mere exercise of the mind and will. Jesus was really immersed in our
human condition; He lived it to the utmost – although without sin – and in such a
way that He understands weakness and fragility. Therefore He is moved to compassion;
He chooses to “suffer with” men, to be penitent together with us. This is the work
of God that Jesus wishes to accomplish: the divine mission to heal those who are wounded
and to cure those who are sick, to take upon Himself the sin of the world.
What
happens at the moment when Jesus was baptized by John? In the face of this humble
act of love on the part of the Son of God, the heavens open and the Holy Spirit is
visibly manifested in the form of a dove, while a voice from on high expresses the
pleasure of the Father, Who recognizes the Only-begotten Son, the Beloved. It is a
true manifestation of the Holy Trinity, which gives testimony to the divinity of Jesus,
to His being the promised Messiah, the One whom God has sent to free His people, so
that His people might be saved (cf. Is 40, 2). Thus is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah
that we heard in the first reading: the Lord God comes with power to destroy the works
of sin and His arm exercises dominion to disarm the Evil one; but keep in mind that
this arm is the arm extended on the Cross, and the power of Christ is the power of
the One who suffers for us: this is the power of God, differing from the power of
the world. Thus God comes in power to destroy sin. Jesus truly acts as the good shepherd,
that feeds His flock and gathers it together so that it will not be scattered (cf.
Is 40, 10-11), and offers His own life that it might live. It is through His redemptive
death that man is freed from the dominion of sin and reconciled with the Father; and
through His resurrection that man is saved from eternal death and is made victorious
over the Evil one.
Dear brothers and sisters, what happens in Baptism, which
will soon be administered to your children? What happens is this: they will be united
in a profound way and forever with Jesus, immersed in the mystery of His power, that
is, in the mystery of His death, which is the source of life, in order to share in
His resurrection, to be reborn to new life. See the miracle that is repeated today
for your children: receiving baptism, they are reborn as children of God, partakers
of the filial relationship that Jesus has with the Father, able to turn to God and
call upon Him with full trust and confidence: “Abba, Father!” On your children, too,
the heavens are opened, and God says: “these are my children, with whom I am well
pleased.” Inserted into this relationship and freed from original sin, they become
living members of the unique body which is the Church, and are enabled to live fully
their vocation to holiness, so as to inherit eternal life, obtained for us by the
resurrection of Jesus.
Dear parents, in asking for Baptism for your children,
you manifest and bear witness to your faith, to the joy of being a Christian and of
belonging to the Church. It is the joy that comes from knowing you have received a
great gift from God – the faith – a gift that none of us have merited, but that has
been freely given and to which we have responded with our “yes.” It is the joy of
recognizing ourselves as children of God, of discovering that we have been entrusted
into His hands, to know that we are welcomed into a loving embrace, in the same way
that a mother supports and embraces her child. This joy, that directs the path of
every Christian, is based on a personal relationship with Jesus, a relationship that
guides the whole of human existence. He, in fact, is the meaning of our life, the
One upon Whom it is worthy to gaze, in order to be enlightened by His Truth and be
able to live life to the fullest. The way of faith that begins today for these children
is therefore based on a certainty, on the experience that there is nothing greater
than to know Christ and to communicate friendship with Him to others; only in this
friendship is the great potential of the human condition truly revealed and we can
experience what is beautiful and what is free (cf. Homily at Mass for the beginning
of his pontificate, April 24, 2005). Those who have this experience are not willing
to give up their faith for anything in the world.
Dear godfathers and godmothers,
yours is the important duty of supporting and contributing to the work of parents
in education, working alongside them in the transmission of the truths of faith and
in witnessing to the values of the Gospel, in raising these children in an ever
deeper friendship with the Lord. May you always give them your good example, through
the exercise of Christian virtues. It is not easy to demonstrate what you believe
in openly and without compromise, especially in the context in which we live, in the
face of a society that often considers those who live by faith in Jesus to be old-fashioned
and out of date. In the wake of this mentality, there can be, even among Christians,
the risk of understanding the relationship with Jesus as limiting, as something that
is detrimental to personal fulfilment, “God is seen as a limitation of our freedom,
a limitation that destroys man’s ability to be himself” (The Infancy of Jesus, 101).
But it is not so! This view demonstrates that it has understood nothing of the relationship
with God, because, proceeding along the path of faith, we understand that Jesus exercises
over us the freeing action of God's love that takes us beyond our selfishness and
keeps us from being turned in on ourselves, in order to lead a full life, a life in
communion with God and open to others. “‘God is love, and whoever remains in love
remains in God and God abides in him’ (1 Jn 4:16). These words from the First Letter
of John express with remarkable clarity the heart of the Christian faith: the Christian
image of God and the resulting image of mankind and its destiny” (Encyclical Deus
caritas est, 1).
The water with which these children will be signed in
the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit immerses them in the
“fount” of life that is God Himself and that will make them His own children. And
the seed of the theological virtues, infused by God – faith, hope and charity – the
seed that today is placed in their hearts through the power of the Holy Spirit, must
always be fed by the Word of God and the Sacraments, so that these virtues of the
Christian can grow and reach full maturity, in order to make each one of them a true
witness of the Lord. While we invoke upon these little children the outpouring of
the Holy Spirit, we entrust them to the protection of the Holy Virgin: May she always
guard them with her maternal presence and accompany them at every moment of their
lives. Amen.