Jesus Unites All People
The Feast of the Epiphany
Sunday, January 5, 2025
Is 60:1-6/Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6/Mt 2:1-12 (Lectionary #20)
Do you feel uncomfortable around people of other nations, cultures or races? Do you have any particular desire to mix with them? To get to know their culture, their way of seeing and doing things? Would you prefer that foreigners who come to our country learn to live and act as we do?
Are you happy when songs at Mass include Spanish phrases along with the Greek (Kyrie Eleison), the Latin (Agnus Dei) and the Hebrew (Hosanna)?
The Entrance Antiphon proclaims, “The Lord is coming: kingship is his, and government and power.” But whether we rejoice in this or not depends on how we expect the Lord to govern. Will he be the kind of king we want?
In the Alternate Opening Prayer we ask God to “draw us beyond the limits which this world imposes, to the life where your Spirit makes all life complete.” We should know that no government on earth can honestly say this prayer.
The task of good governments is to foster the common good of their own people in this world. An enlightened politician might recognize that the “common good” must include spiritual, eternal good as well as material well-being on this earth. But no government has the duty or the right to decide how that spiritual, eternal good is to be attained. To make that decision is to choose a religion, which must be left to the free choice of every individual. So governments may only restrict behavior that has destructive effects on the life of people within “the limits which this world imposes,” not “beyond” them. Governments have no right to determine what is a sin, only to decide which sins shall be punished as crimes. And that depends on the government’s judgment about what helps or damages society as a whole.
The truth is that the “common good” of one country is never authentic if it is achieved at the expense of other countries. A country that enriches itself by impoverishing others is building a time-bomb under itself. But it takes so much enlightenment to see this that in practice politicians are commonly elected to foster the particular good of their own countries here and now. They operate within, not beyond, “the limits which this world imposes.” Using this standard, there is no country in the world that would elect Jesus to public office!
Isaiah’s Vision
The Responsorial Psalm proclaims with joy, “Lord, every nation on earth will adore you” (Psalm 72). But the way Isaiah pictured this happening was quite different from what God was really saying through him.
Isaiah 60: 1-6 sees God making Israel sovereign among all nations: “Rise up in splendor, Jerusalem! … Nations shall walk by your light…. The wealth of nations shall be brought to you.” Even Isaiah could not see “beyond the limits which this world imposes” to envision a world in which all people would be equal and united, not under one government, but under the reign of God, by embracing his truth, his love, in one Church.
The Epiphany
Matthew 2: 1-12 gives us a preview of it. The story of the Magi made clear to the Jewish Christians (Matthew’s audience) that the Church’s openness to the Gentiles was not just an afterthought of the Apostles, contrary to God’s original intention. By legend the “magi” were “stargazers” who sought to know God by studying the rhythm of the universe. In the very beginning God himself called the magi from the strange and distant “east.” And he invited them through a star, presumably a symbol from their own “pagan” religion. He spoke to them in their own language to draw them to the Word beyond all languages made flesh in Jesus Christ.
It is not God’s plan to exalt any culture — whether Jewish or Roman! — over any other. When we sing, “Lord, every nation on earth will adore you,” we mean that each nation and culture will express worship in its own way, according to its own rules and customs, united only by “one Lord, one faith, one baptism,” but “making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4: 1-6).
In the “catholic” or “universal” Church there are fourteen different “rites” or cultural ways of expressing the same faith, each with its own rules and customs. And there could be many more.
What there must not be, if the Church is to remain truly “catholic,” is any attempt to impose uniformity, or one culture’s way of seeing things, one culture’s liturgical preferences or methods of government, on all the others. God’s “plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1: 9-10), is not a plan to wipe out all differences, but to bring about the beauty of unity amid variety by preserving them. Through Christ God “was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross” (Colossians 1:20), so that there might be “one body and one Spirit… one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all” (Ephesians 4: 4-6). This is our vision as Church: “Lord, every nation on earth will adore you,” each according to the richness and diversity of its own culture.
Because it is hard for us to let God “draw us beyond the limits” of our own particular culture’s way of seeing things, beyond the sameness of what we grew up with and what we are used to, we naturally resist change. We especially resist, and even resent, changes that ask us to embrace other cultures’ ways of expressing themselves, ways that seem foreign to us — even when we are only asked to include them in our parish life, not to give up our own.
In the post-isolationist United States, where more and more cities and parishes are becoming multi-cultural in population, this is a felt problem. Where “foreigners” are becoming less of a minority — as Hispanic and other immigrants are in overwhelming numbers — we are challenged, not just to tolerate, but to embrace diversity. We are invited to open ourselves gladly to the fullness of life, both human and divine, where God’s Spirit “makes all life complete” and all are enriched by diversity within a Church that is “one body and one Spirit” expressing itself in a multitude of ways. Then we can rejoice in harmony with God’s Spirit when we not only say, “Lord, every nation on earth will adore you,” but see it happening before our eyes.
St. Paul’s Revelation
Ephesians 3: 2-6 announces the “mystery” of God’s plan that was “not made known to people in other generations,” including Isaiah, but made known to Paul “by revelation.” It is that “the Gentiles are coheirs, members of the same body, and copartners in the promise in Christ Jesus through the Gospel.”
What this meant in practice, in the life of the early Church, was that the non-Jews who came into the Church came in as equals. They did not have to become Jews, embrace Jewish liturgy and customs, or obey the religious laws of Judaism. The Church in Jerusalem decided this and proclaimed it to the new converts (Acts 15: 1-30). Then Paul spent the rest of his life defending it against those Jewish Christians who, steeped in their traditions, refused to accept it.
Today, it is clear that our prayer needs to be, more than ever: “Lord, draw us beyond the limits which this world imposes, to the life where your Spirit makes all life complete.”
Insight: How do I feel now about mixing with people of other cultures or races? Can I welcome exposure to their music, dress, dance, and traditions within the liturgy?
Initiative: Deliberately attend some Masses that are in other languages or traditions. When your parish sings bilingual hymns, join in like a catholic Catholic.
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