A homily for The Epiphany of the Lord, January 8, 2023
Is 60:1-6, Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6, Mt 2:1-12
These are the days of miracle and wonder…
… The way we look to a distant constellation
That’s dying in a corner of the sky
These are the days of miracle and wonder
In 1986, Paul Simon opened his “Graceland” album with the song “The Boy in the Bubble.” In it, his lyrics rattled off a list of technological marvels the world was only starting to learn about. Lasers in the jungle transmitting information. The baby with the baboon heart. The boy with no immune system who had to live in a germ-free bubble.
Fast-forward to now, and with the James Webb Space Telescope, we indeed are looking to distant constellations.
Miraculous.
Wonderful.
Amazing.
So what are we going to do about it?
First of all, we are going to acknowledge that we truly are amazed, even though Lake Superior State University in Michigan garnered no shortage of headlines for its annual list of words or phrases that should be banished from everyday speech, and “amazing” was smack-dab in the middle of the list.
And LSSU’s scholars were absolutely correct in their reasoning that “amazing” is overused to the point where, if everything is amazing, then nothing is.
But the JWST’s images are amazing. They demonstrate how science amplifies faith. They show us the hand of God at work.
They show us the same hand of God that ignited the star that led the Magi to drop everything, saddle up their camels and bring improbable treasures to a baby and his peasant family.
God ignited the amazing star with its amazingly strong pull, a pull on these scholars of the skies that exceeded any amount of gravity or magnetism they had ever encountered.
We could spend days talking and speculating about the Magi (heck, Church scholars were still doing it in the Eighth Century): How many were there? Where precisely in the east did they come from? What were their names? What’s up with 20+C+M+B+23? Why did it take so long for them to get to Bethlehem? Were they kings, princes, viscounts, wizards, some sort of seers, or all of the above? What religion(s) did they practice?
Why was the Holy Family still in Bethlehem after about two years? Did Caesar’s census take that long?
So many questions, with so many of the answers coming from Church Tradition more than the Scriptures. So many of the answers to these questions are sincere guesses aimed at strengthening our faith.
So we’re not going to puzzle over the details. Frankly (not frankincense-ly; sorry, I couldn’t resist), we don’t have another eight centuries.
Instead, we have Answer No. 2 to my question about what we’re going to do about it. We will allow the richness of these Scripture passages and all the other stories that have swirled up around Caspar, Melchior and Balthazar to give us a believable scene in our mind’s eye. We can be amazed and impressed that these Magi from the East had enough majesty themselves that they could simply drop in on King Herod — Hey, hi, Herod, how ya doin’, nice palace ya got here — even though the king they wanted to see was the babe, the son of Mary.
The amazing power and attraction of Jesus were evident from the day of his birth, evident equally to his fellow children of Abraham and to the Gentiles throughout the Middle East and the world.
Is that attraction evident to us? Do we feel the pull? Are we willing to drop everything because we are amazed? Just how far are we willing to go? Is it far enough?
Thus, Answer No. 3 to “What are we going to do about it” differs for each of us. Because only we ourselves know individually what it will take for us to trek to find Jesus.
To recognize his star today and get off our duffs to seek Christ in the faces of everyone we meet.
To bring improbable gifts to unlikely recipients. To use our individual God-given talents and skills and personalities to do so.
To share some of whatever makes us unique with a sister or brother in need. To be ready and grateful to receive as well. Every one of us — yes, every one of us — needs something only another person can give. Relationships are built on giving and receiving gracefully and joyfully, especially our relationship with the Almighty.
If we, too, look for Jesus’s still-shining star and let it lead us wherever our loving Triune God wants us to be, then we can help make the world…
Miraculous.
Wonderful.
Amazing.
