Baptismal Death & Resurrection

01-09-2022Weekly Reflection© J. S. Paluch Company

As we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord, we also honor our own baptism as our initiation into the Christian life and community. In the Gospel, the baptism of Jesus, with his immersion and then emergence from the water, points to his later submission to God at his death, and his emergence from the grave at his resurrection.

This pattern of death and resurrection is our path too, as followers of Jesus. Throughout life, often in small ways, we learn to surrender our limited and self-centered agendas. This surrender often feels like death. The sacrament of Baptism ritually enacts this pattern to remind us of Jesus’ death and resurrection, so that we too might embrace the deaths and resurrections of our own lives. As Jesus emerged from the water, he encountered his Father and the Holy Spirit. Like Jesus, we can know we are God’s beloved, empowered by the Spirit.