ON SHINING FORTH

 

The Solemnity of the Epiphany (January 6, or in many dioceses Sunday, January 8) celebrates God's showing forth His Son, the newborn Emmanuel, to the nations, represented by the magi "from the East." In many countries this feast has become a major festival, a time for gift-giving, joyous processions, and solemn liturgical ceremonies. 

Shortly after this celebration, within a week at most (in 2023 the period is only one day) the Christmas season comes to an end with the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, and the church calendar returns us to "ordinary time" until Ash Wednesday at the beginning of Lent. 

In this post I want to take a closer look at the meaning of the mystery of the Epiphany. What can the Epiphany mean for me? Of course preachers have been mining the rich symbolism in Matthew's story for 2,000 years and have found countless answers to this question. (You can connect with my former posts on the Epiphany by using the column to the left of this post.) Right now I'd like to share a reflection that came to me yesterday.

If the coming of the wise men symbolizes all the nations of the earth coming to recognize and adore the Divine infant, we'd have to admit that it has remained just a pretty symbol. Even in so-called Christian countries we see little evidence of people's paying homage to Jesus Christ and His mission to save the world from sin and death. So, after we read the charming story of the three wise men in the Gospel of Matthew, we have to ask ourselves, "Was the Epiphany a flop? Just a charming fantasy that some Christians celebrate each year with processions and parties?"

To help us answer this question I offer the following poem by T.S. Eliot. We monks reflect on it at Vespers of the Epiphany every year. I invite you to read it slowly and let the images draw you in.

"The Journey of the Magi" -- T.S. Eliot

A cold coming we had of it,

Just the worst time of the year

For a journey, and such a long journey:

The was deep and the weather sharp,

The very dead of winter.

And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,

Lying down in the melting snow.

There were times we regretted

The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,

And the silken girls bringing sherbet.

Then the camel men cursing and grumbling

And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,

And the night-fires gong out, and the lack of shelters,

And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly

And the villages dirty, and charging high prices.:

A hard time we had of it.

At the end we preferred to travel all night,

Sleeping in snatches,

With the voices singing in our ears, saying

That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,

Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;

With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,

And three trees on the low sky,

And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.

Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,

Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,

And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.

But there was no information, and so we continued

And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon

Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,

And I would do it again, but set down

This set down

This: were we led all that way for

Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,

We had evide

But had thought they were different; this Birth was

Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.

We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,

But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,

With an alien people clutching their gods.

I should be glad of another death.        

I am struck every year by what happens, or more to the point, what does not happen in the final lines of

the poem: "We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation," Whatever the event of the Epiphany meant for these magi, it was interior, and personal. The pagan kingdoms were left unchanged by the coming of the infant King of the Jews.

What change might I expect to experience from my own visit to the Infant King this year? That's the question I've been reflecting on. The Greek word that underlies "epiphany" means "showing forth" or even "shining forth." So, it seems to me, that the Epiphany is a challenge to me to "show forth" and "shine forth" the saving presence of Christ to the people I live with and work with, and to the hundreds of kids I encounter every day.

What does this "shining forth" look like? Jesus himself taught us by his example how to show God's saving presence in the world: through humble self-giving service, meeknmess, gentleness, openness to outcasts and sinners, kindness to the poor and the weak, and on and on.

Let us pray, as the Christmas season draws to a close, for the grace to recognize and respond to the countless opportunities we are given every day, to be a shining forth of Jesus' loving presence in the world.