Homily for the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord 2009

Some of my earliest memories as a child are of family visits to an uncle's dairy farm. We would watch the cows being rounded up for milking, and observe the fascinating process of milking itself trying not to be kicked by the cows. Memories of running through paddocks of Queensland Blue pumpkins stretching as far as the eye of a seven year old could see. A not so pleasant memory of those excursions is of swimming in the local creek on the farm. Once I was thrown into the creek as I was a bit hesitant. (Sink or swim was the philosophy of the time when teaching children to swim, I think.) Being unable to swim at the time I panicked and went under. I imagined I was drowning as I gasped for breath. But my father pulled me out much to my relief. So I stand here alive today! Such memories stay with you. I can still remember the relief of being able to breathe again and of my father looking over me! Life itself.

That experience of almost drowning and coming up again is the symbol of Baptism. We die with Christ in order to rise with him.

When Jesus came up out of the river Jordan when John baptised him, Mark tells us that Jesus saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove, and the voice of the Father say "You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased" (Mark 1:11). That affirmation of the Father for the Son is a fundamental statement of our Christian origins that permeates everything. As much as there is an immense difference between God and the creature there is still on God's part a desire for a close connection of love. Now, the heavens remain torn open for all. In Jesus life we see that opening explicitly at the Transfiguration and again at his death when the curtain of the Holy of Holies in the Temple was torn in two. In Jesus there is an opening to the life of the Trinity. The sacred and the secular are connected.

You may have read of the British Humanist Association's promotion recently. They have put banners on buses in England which say, "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." The campaign is partly in response to evangelising campaigns of some Churches in England. So some more fundamentalist Christians responded by challenging the Humanist campaign as false advertising! On the other hand we might say, "There probably is a God. So stop worrying and enjoy life!" We can say this because this is what Baptism says. The foundation of our joy and our life is the affirmation by God of who we are, his beloved children.

I do admire the honesty of the search that some people engage in to find meaning in life and death. There are plenty of people for whom the whole issue of God is irrelevant. Some reject any idea of God outright. There are yet others who while rejecting the God of Christians do make an honest claim for the reasonableness of their own attitude to life and death.

It is often said that human beings are the only animals that know they are going to die. This knowledge of death and the questions it raises is the starting point of most religious movements throughout history. Uniquely, human beings can ask, why are we here? Is this all there is? Many will say we are here simply because of a chance meeting of a number of conditions in the pyhsical universe. And what you see is what you get. That is all there is. Others take great delight simply in the fact of being a part of the mystery of the universe and of life and say they do not need a God to make sense of it. Just accept things for the wonder and beauty of what they are and enjoy life.

We could accept that last attitude as a starting point. We can humbly acknowledge our ignorance as we stand before the mystery. The environmental movement has alerted us to the fact of our place in nature. We are not just a special being separate from it. God's creation is not just a testing ground for us either. It is the beginning of life. Jesus baptism tell us as much.

Jews were not baptised. Only converts to Judaism were. Jews saw themselves as God's people by birth. They did not need any ritual admission into their race or religion. Circumcision was a commitment to the Covenant with God whose people they are. The baptism John was offering tapped into a deep need of the people. Their experience of Roman occupation and poverty was not made easier by their religious organisation. And the oppressive interpretation of the Law of Moses meant that their faith was not life giving. As the people assembled they were heeding the words of Isaiah some 500 years before that we heard in the first reading today. "Come to the water all you who are thirsty." Something had to change and it had to begin with themselves. This baptism was one of repentance, that is, of being renewed.

Jesus did not need that baptism, as we believe him to be sinless and at one with God, even though he may not have realised the full implications of his state at the time. Yet, he chose to identify himself with a searching and sinful humanity who went out into the wilderness to hear John and be baptised. This is a wonderful transformation. God is accessible to everyone, from the lowest to the highest, saint and sinner. There in the river he is announced in another epiphany as the Beloved of God. His mission was to help us realise that we too are God's beloved children. To be baptised into Jesus is to be baptised with the Holy Spirit, the spirit of power and of life. We become, as St Johns reading tells us, begotten of God. Or as St Paul says, adopted children of God.

Water can be at once both life taking and life giving. Baptism takes us away from a life of being without a name, to become a child of God.

Fr Graham