Celebrating the Seasons. Robert Atwell
us that, from the moment of the incarnation, the good news of Jesus Christ is for all: Jew and Gentile, the wise and the simple, male and female. The readings throughout the season resonate with this truth, celebrating the universality of God’s love, particularly as exemplified in the call of the disciples and in the public ministry of Jesus; and in the mission of the Church to embody it.
The season culminates on 2 February with The Presentation of Christ in the Temple, commonly known as Candlemas. According to St Luke, the occasion of Mary’s ritual purification was made memorable by Simeon the High Priest acclaiming the Christ-child as ‘the light of the Gentiles and the glory of his people Israel’. Recent liturgical revision has restored the feast to its pivotal place in the calendar. It now forms the finale of the incarnational cycle and turns our attention towards the forthcoming passion.
The Epiphany
A Reading from a sermon of Peter Chrysologos, Bishop of Ravenna
In the mystery of our Lord’s incarnation there were clear indications of his eternal Godhead. Yet the great events we celebrate today disclose and reveal in different ways the fact that God himself took a human body. Mortals, enshrouded always in darkness, must not be left in ignorance, and so be deprived of what they can understand and retain only by grace.
In choosing to be born for us, God chose to be known by us. He therefore reveals himself in this way, in order that this great sacrament of his love may not be an occasion for us of great misunderstanding.
Today the Magi find, crying in a manger, the one they have followed as he shone in the sky. Today the Magi see clearly, in swaddling clothes, the one they have long awaited as he lay hidden among the stars. Today the Magi gaze in deep wonder at what they see: heaven on earth, earth in heaven, humankind in God, God in human flesh, one whom the whole universe cannot contain now enclosed in a tiny body. As they look, they believe and do not question, as their symbolic gifts bear witness: incense for God, gold for a king, myrrh for one who is to die.
So the Gentiles, who were the last, become the first: the faith of the Magi is the firstfruits of the belief of the Gentiles.
Today Christ enters the Jordan to wash away the sin of the world. John himself testifies that this is why he has come: ‘Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world.’ Today a servant lays his hand on the Lord, a man lays his hand on God. John lays his hand on Christ, not to forgive but to receive forgiveness.
Today, as the psalmist prophesied: ‘The voice of the Lord is heard – above the waters.’ What does the voice say? ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’
Today the Holy Spirit hovers over the waters in the likeness of a dove. A dove announced to Noah that the flood had disappeared from the earth; so now a dove is to reveal that the world’s shipwreck is at an end for ever. The sign is no longer an olive-shoot of the old stock: instead, the Spirit pours out on Christ’s head the full richness of a new anointing by the Father, to fulfil what the psalmist had prophesied: ‘Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.’
Today Christ works the first of his signs from heaven by turning water into wine. But water has still to be changed into the sacrament of his blood, so that Christ may offer spiritual drink from the chalice of his body.
alternative reading
A Reading from a hymn of Ephrem of Syria
Who, being a mortal, can tell about the Reviver of all,
Who left the height of his majesty and came down to smallness?
You, who magnify all by being born, magnify my weak mind
that I may tell about your birth,
not to investigate your majesty,
but to proclaim your grace.
Blessed is he who is both hidden and revealed in his actions!
It is a great wonder that the Son, who dwelt entirely in a body,
inhabited it entirely, and it sufficed for him.
Although limitless, he dwelt in it.
His will was entirely in him; but his totality was not in him.
Who is sufficient to proclaim that
although he dwelt entirely in a body,
still he dwelt entirely in the universe?
Blessed is the Unlimited who was limited!
Your majesty is hidden from us; your grace is revealed before us.
I will be silent, my Lord, about your majesty,
but I will speak about your grace.
Your grace made you a babe;
your grace made you a human being.
Your majesty contracted and stretched out.
Blessed is the power that became small and became great!
The Magi rejoiced from afar; the scribes proclaimed from nearby.
The prophet showed his erudition, and Herod his fury.
The scribes showed interpretations; the Magi showed offerings.
It is a wonder that to one babe the kinspeople rushed
with their swords,
but strangers with their offerings.
Blessed is your birth that stirred up the universe!
alternative reading
A Reading from a sermon of Lancelot Andrewes preached before King James I at Whitehall in 1620
What place more proper for him who is ‘the living bread that came down from heaven’, to give life to the world, than Bethlehem, the least and lowest of all the houses of Judah. This natural birth-place of his sheweth his spiritual nature. Christ’s birth fell in the sharpest season, in the deep of winter. As humility his place, so affliction his time. The time and place fit well.
And there came from the East wise men, Gentiles; and that concerns us, for so are we. Christ’s birth is made manifest to them by the star of heaven. It is the Gentiles’ star, and so ours too. We may set our course by it, to seek and find, and worship him as well as they. So we come in, for ‘God hath also to the Gentiles set open a door of faith,’ and that he would do this, and call us in, there was some small star-light from the beginning. This he promised by the patriarchs, shadowed forth in the figures of the law and the temple and the tabernacle, and foresung in the psalms, and it is this day fulfilled.
These wise men are come and we with them. Not only in their own names, but in ours did they make their entry; came and sought after, and found and worshipped, their Saviour and ours, the Saviour of the whole world. A little wicket there was left open, whereat divers Gentiles did come in, but only one or two. But now the great gate set wide opens this day for all – for these here with their camels and dromedaries to enter, and all their carriage. Christ is not only for russet cloaks, shepherds and such; but even grandees, great states such as these came too; and when they came were welcome to him. For they were sent for and invited by this star, their star properly.
They came a long journey, and they came an uneasy journey. They came now, at the worst season of the year. And all but to do worship at Christ’s birth. They stayed not their coming till the opening of the year, till they might have better weather and way, and have longer days, and so more seasonable and fit to travel in. So desirous were they to come with the first, and to be there as soon as possibly they might; broke through all these difficulties, and behold, they did come.
And we, what excuse shall we have if we come not? If so short and easy a way we come not, as from our chambers hither? And these wise men were never a whit less wise for so coming; nay, to come to Christ is one of the wisest parts that ever these wise men did. And if we believe this, that this was their wisdom, if they and we be wise in