The new year is a good time to take stock of our lives and see where we can pay more attention to the needs of others
Epiphany Sunday celebrates the revelation of Jesus to the Gentiles. Visitors to Jesus’ birthplace were representative of all the people of the world. God’s love was meant for everyone, not to be given by religion, nation of origin or any other separating factor. King Herod was threatened by the birth of a person who could take away his power, influence and prestige. He asked the Wise Men to report back to him where the infant Jesus was born, with the secret intention to destroy the child. These three wise visitors did not allow themselves to become accessories to murder. They were wise and took another way home.
This feast is always at the beginning of a new calendar year. It symbolizes saying goodbye to the past and starting anew. Part of the invitation of the new year is to recognize where we might have allowed our lives to be manipulated into leading us further away from Jesus rather than closer to Him. How can we best pause at the beginning of this new year and take stock of our current lives?
The first step is becoming conscious of our habitual lives. Our lives are predictable, and we can easily form habits based on that predictability. We often fail to hear the prophetic voices around us that ask us to go a different way. Changing our behavior can cause fear and anxiety, and can feel threatening. But deep in our hearts, we know there is something about our lives that needs to change. Are we willing to go a different way?
There might be some ways in which we choose to sin. We may find our lives so boring sometimes that we spread gossip about other people. We may have found it so difficult to forgive someone for a past hurt that we consciously exclude them from our lives. We may be overindulging, to our own detriment and the detriment of those around us. We may have allowed ourselves to prioritize certain things over Jesus Christ. We may see what others have and become unsatisfied with the life we’ve been given. These are choices we make — whether conscious or unconscious — that actively harm ourselves and those around us. As we become more conscious of them, are we willing to go a different way? Are we willing to risk what is for what could be?
Most of us live good lives and try to be the kind of people God has asked us to be. But sometimes we indulge and refuse to take the next steps to deeper sacrificial living and loving. Holiday food collections are over for the year. Is that our excuse to ignore the needs of those around us? Do we really need somebody ringing a bell with a red kettle for us to know people are hungry and homeless? Do we really need a season in which a giving tree is placed in a church? Thank God, there are people who do these things to remind us of what we sometimes fail to notice. Thank God, there are people who walk the walk all year long and are constantly attentive to the needs of the poor, the abused and the neglected.
This reflection I offer this week is not to produce shame and guilt, but simply to raise with each of us an awareness of our lack of action beyond the holiday season. Are you willing to go a different way? The kingdom of God is at hand!
Father Donald Wester is retired and serves as lecturer of homiletics at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary.
