On this the eve of the final day of
Christmas I say to you, Merry Christmas!
The liturgical year is moving right
along.
Advent had us preparing for the Light.
Christmas has us rejoicing in the
Light.
And tomorrow, Epiphany will have us
celebrating the Light.
For those of us who can’t remember,
Epiphany means the manifestation of the incarnation—or the revelation of God.
Epiphany is a church festival
celebrated every January 6th that commemorates the coming of the
Magi as the first manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles or, in the Eastern
Church, the commemoration of the baptism of Christ.
Epiphany is often overlooked in our
churches.
After all, its time to focus our
attention on all those resolutions we did or didn’t make. And there’s a reason
why the people who created the liturgical calendar called this time ordinary.
While we could easily fall back into
the habits of ‘ordinary’ life, succumbing to the hopelessness the news
perpetuates, reducing our concerns to only those who look like, sound like, and
align ideologically with us, I want to offer an alternative perspective: life viewed through the lens of Epiphany.
Epiphany is the day the world is made
known of God’s claim once more on all the earth. Advent (“the prophets foretold
the coming of the Light”) and Christmas (“the angels praised the Light”) find
their fulfillment in the Epiphany, which invites all the nations of the earth
to come and worship the Savior of the world.
God is with us. God is in us. We can
encounter God in the daily activities of our lives just as we did during Advent
and Christmas. God dwells in the ordinary.
Yet, here’s the thing about Epiphany,
nothing about it is ordinary. It’s the season of the magi’s discovery, Christ’s
baptism, and ultimately, the proclamation that God often shows up where we
least expect it.
Epiphany
reminds us that God comes to us among the lonely and forgotten, the poor and
the vulnerable, the refugee and the stranger—in the life of a child whose
parents are terrified refugees.
Tomorrow
we read the story of the Magi and the truth of John 1:9 is revealed – the truth
of God, coming into the world, enlightens all creation and every person. Every
child is an incarnation of our beloved Savior.
This means, you.
Yes, you.
You are a child of God, created in the
image and likeness of Love.
And in the mystery of the Word made
flesh, the fullness revealed in the Epiphany, God has caused a new light to
shine our hearts. Together we are a light shining in a darkened world.
Finally, friends, I extend an
invitation for you and your families to begin something new. In ancient times,
before calendars were easily accessible, it became the practice of the Church
on the Feast of the Epiphany to announce the dates of what lay ahead in the
liturgical year. Such dates included Ash Wednesday, Easter Sunday, the day of
the Ascension, and Pentecost.
One of the reasons the church did this
was to remind the people that though we’ve packed up the Christmas ornaments
and placed the poinsettias in the garbage can, the story is not over. To drive
this point home the church started a fun tradition known as “the blessing of
the chalk.” Probably because of the detail in the day’s Gospel, that the Magi
entered “the house” where the Holy Family then resided, the practice arose of
blessing chalk during or after church and either the clergy or the people
themselves taking that chalk and blessing the house in which the people lived.
The mark was placed over the entrance door in the form of the year. So for
instance, 2017 would look like this:
20+C+M+B+17. The initials indicated the supposed names of the Magi
(Caspar, Melchior, Balthasar, preceded by a cross showing their sainthood).
“Chalking the door” is a way to
celebrate and literally mark the occasion of the Epiphany and God’s blessing of
our lives and homes. With time the chalk will fade. As it does we let the
meaning of the symbols written sink into the depths of our hearts and manifest
in our words and actions.
Bet you didn’t know Epiphany had so
much going on with it, did ya? See, there’s really nothing ordinary about this
time.
If you want me to come and bless your
home with chalk, let me know.
In the meantime, please receive this blessing
on the eve of Epiphany:
Merry
Christmas!
Happy New Year!
And much
happiness to you during these Epiphany days!
A
 |
| The initials CMB (lower right corner) has also come to mean, "Christus mansionem benedicat." This is Latin for "[May] Christ bless this house." |
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