The journey of our lives to Christ is rarely a straight path. Especially for those who were baptized into the Catholic faith as babies, we often need to find our own way by winding roads and paths until we arrive at and embrace faith as our own. Merriam-Webster defines “epiphany” as “a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something.” Almost always, this entails a “Aha!” moment, which changes the course of the story.
I experienced this in my own life in the middle of the Covid pandemic. When the world began to shut down, I finally knew that I was not alone, and that I never had been. You see, I found myself newly pregnant for the fifth time with no living children, after having experienced loss after loss. In my pain and struggle, I had turned from God the previous fall when it seemed door after door had closed for the opportunity to have a child.
But while the world was radically changing, I had an incredible moment which can only be described as an epiphany from the Holy Spirit: I became acutely aware that I was not alone, nor had I ever been alone. Struggling with feeling alone was something that had plagued me throughout my life. And now, suddenly, in the middle of a world that was radically shifting toward being apart, I came to believe that I was not alone, had never been alone, and will never be alone. How radical!
It is also radical that, in the course of human history – of salvation history – God would reveal Himself to all of humanity. After all, God was the God of Israel. And yet, God planned to reveal Himself in the form of a helpless baby to all nations. Juxtapositions abound with God, and somehow they all make sense. Today, as we celebrate the Solemnity of The Epiphany of the Lord, may we always be open to the seeming contradictions that God places in our lives and be willing to learn from them.
Daily Reading
Monday after Epiphany
Reading 1 1 John 3:22–4:6 Beloved: We receive from him whatever we ask, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And his commandment is this: we should…
Saint of the Day
Saint André Bessette
Saint André Bessette expressed a saint’s faith by a lifelong devotion to St. Joseph. He was the eighth of 12 children born to a French Canadian couple near Montreal. At his canonization in October 2010, Pope Benedict XVI said that St. Andre “lived the beatitude of the pure of heart.”
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