Baptism of the Lord Jesus
January 9, 2010
Today’s Gospel relates one of the big questions of the early Church. All four Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles relate at least once the story of the baptism of Jesus by John. John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. Those who came to John were acknowledging their sinfulness. The problem is that here we have John, who was cleansed of original sin by the presence of Jesus while he was just a six month old in his mother’s womb, asking Jesus to baptize him. And we hear of Jesus, born of a sinless Virgin, and Himself like us in all things except sin, accepting baptism from John. Have we been kidding ourselves for two thousand years? Are John and Jesus really sinners like the rest of us?
To understand fully the baptism administered by John, our own sacrament of baptism, and Jesus’s role in baptism, would take a long study. Even then we would just scratch the surface of the reality. But let’s go back to the first baptism in the Jordan, with another one named Jesus–Jah-shua. It was over a thousand years earlier, when the people of Israel came out of the desert to invade Palestine. Their leader, whom we call Joshua, summoned the people to him. The ark of the covenant was carried into the Jordan River and instantly it dried up, allowing Israel to cross over dry-shod, just as they had when delivered from Egypt forty years earlier. Joshua called the people to obedience, and the uncircumcised among them were circumcised. They became full members of the people of God, and promised their undying obedience to the one true God.
Jesus went down into the pool by the river and submitted to John pouring water over His head for exactly the same reason–to symbolically promise undying obedience to the Father. The Father replied, anointing Jesus with the Holy Spirit–this is my Son, my beloved, in whom I am well pleased. As the first Jah-shua and his people promised divine obedience, and received divine confirmation and anointing, so the last Jah-shua, the Son of God, promised obedience, and received divine anointing. And as He did, He forever changed the meaning of baptism, so that when one of the priests or deacons baptizes a child or adult, any sin really is taken away, and the parents or adult recipient promise obedience to God’s law. The root meaning of baptism is a promise of obedience. And, for those of us who are sinners–I and all of you–it means that at baptism, and every time we confess our sins, and even at every communion, we come to God repenting of our sins and promising to obey his commandments. This is how we express our solidarity with Jesus, who came to obey the Father, as both Son and Servant of God, and thus we together fulfill all righteousness.
St. Proclus said it well, “Christ appeared in the world, and, bringing beauty out of chaos, gave it luster and joy. He bore the world’s sin and crushed the world’s enemy. He sanctified the fountains of waters and enlightened the minds of men.” (PG 65, 758)
Chaos and sin are products of disobedience. Beauty and joy are products of obedience. The United States of America are now living out the pain and chaos of the sin of disobedience. Each January we are reminded of how far we have fallen, so far that we have legitimated and institutionalized the murder of the innocent. The only way back to beauty and joy is to regain an understanding of God’s law, and to pursue it wholeheartedly. Let me explain.
A few days ago all the media were astir with the realization that the oldest members of my generation, the Boomers, are turning 65 this year. They immediately began clucking their tongues about the implications of millions of us going on Medicare and drawing Social Security. And “oh, what shall we do?” The fact is that the only reason Medicare and Social Security didn’t go broke thirty years ago is that the Boomer generation formed natural families and started having children and investing in their upbringing. And the only reason that could happen is that our parents–and some of you are old enough to have Boomer kids–formed natural families and bore and raised the largest generation in history up to then. In 1963, the fertility rate was 3.6. That, research has proved, is the minimum rate that would have sustained Social Security indefinitely.
As the ruling elite saw it, however, that was a big problem. African Americans and Catholics were the ones forming large natural families. Their political power was getting out of hand. The documents show that these leaders poured money into research to develop what they called a “Catholic contraceptive.” Soon we were hearing about this wonderful new hormonal pill that worked “naturally” to space children. The foundations gave grant money to the premier Catholic university, whose theologians said, yes, the Pill is a fine thing. A Catholic doctor, John Rock, went all across the country saying that the Pill is a natural means of birth regulation. Catholics literally ate it up. We were well and truly hoodwinked. And within ten years, 1973, the U.S. fertility rate had dropped by 50%. That same year, the United States Supreme Court declared every abortion law and regulation unconstitutional. The so-called “baby bust,” combined with the high divorce rate that resulted from messing with the natural law, has put us in the horrible position we now occupy. In less than 50 years, this rejection of God’s law has given us a 50% divorce rate, a 40% abortion rate, utter confusion over what marriage is, and the worst economy since the Great Depression. Oh–and don’t forget a breast cancer rate that has nearly tripled.
What can we do? First we must dedicate ourselves to prayer and repentance. This disaster has not happened by itself; in some way all are responsible. Let’s admit the fact that most of us adult Catholics have made ourselves sterile in some way or another. Some have even gone so far as to abort children–either by use of the Pill, morning-after pill, or direct surgical abortion. We cannot be healed without repenting of that sin and confessing it. Priests hear these sins all the time. Don’t be afraid or embarrassed to admit it to yourself, your spouse, the priest, and the loving Father. Then pray and do penance. Work in a shelter for single pregnant moms. Adopt, or support a Catholic adoption agency. Learn and promote natural birth regulation–really natural–with the Couple to Couple league or similar organization.
Let’s also understand that the problem has gotten worse. We all know that the twenties and thirties generation has the lowest rate of marriage, and the highest rate of cohabitation, in US history. This is an injustice, especially to women, who lose the security of legal marriage for themselves and their children. But it’s also an injustice to men, because even after they marry, if they do, the divorce rate in such situations is almost off the chart. These guys are morally cut adrift by the whole awful experience. Between 2005 and 2010, the number of baptisms in our parish have fallen by 44%. That’s scary.
Obviously we need as a parish and as a church to address this problem. I have written our new Archbishop to express my concern over the cohabitation rate, the marriage rate, and the collapse of the birth rate. But there are things we can do in our families. Yes, prayer, discussion of the issues are critical. We especially need to protect our young by sharing with them the natural means of creating loving Christian families. A simple estate planning tool allows your estate to be distributed equally to each member of a generation, so that families with larger numbers of children benefit more than families with few or no children. Participate this month in rallies and prayer for life, and against abortion. Write your congressman and Senators to stop paying for abortion. Stop the funding of the terrorist organization Planned Parenthood.
Contraception, abortion and divorce are plagues on our society and our Church. Repentance, prayer, fasting and family awareness are the cures. Nobody likes to talk about these things, but by our silence–our sin of omission–we make the problem worse. Jesus Christ came to heal us of our most serious disease–sin. The healing begins with obedience. Our sin began with disobedience; our healing begins with obedience.
