Dear St. Paul Family and Friends,

As I have repeatedly emphasized, Christmas is a season in our liturgical calendar. It begins on the eve of Christmas and ends on the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord (today). Tomorrow, we begin the season of Ordinary Time. You will notice some changes in the liturgy. The creche, the tree, and other Christmas decors are removed. The general liturgical color is changed from white to green. The readings will begin to focus on the public life and ministry of Jesus. Baptism, as you know, signals the public life of Jesus.

Most bible scholars agree that the baptism of Jesus is a historical event. With a high degree of certainty, scholars agree that in history, a man named Jesus existed and was baptized by a person named John the Baptist. Among various criteria, two will be helpful for us. First is the criterion of multiple attestation. All four gospel writers report the event. In the synoptics, you will find it in Matthew 3, 13-17, Mark 1, 9-11 and Luke 3, 21-22. Read them and you can easily identify parallel details. In John 1, 32-34, you will find not a narrative of the event but the testimony of John as an eyewitness.

I mentioned in the past that you can find quite a number of events in the Synoptic Gospels but very few in all four of them. You can find the Baptism, the Feeding of the Multitude, the Choosing of the Twelve, the Trial Before Pontius Pilate, the Death and Crucifixion of Jesus, and the Appearances after Jesus’ Resurrection. Bible Scholars put value on the criterion of multiple attestation to establish the historicity of an event.

The second is the criterion of embarrassment. In essence, it states that unless this event was historical, Christian writers would have not included it because at that time, it was utterly embarrassing to be baptized by John. You may recall that John preached a baptism of repentance. If the goal was to present Jesus as the Messiah, a baptism of repentance would not at all help. But there was no intent to “edit” the events in the life of Jesus. The gospel writers simply reported what really occurred.

See how beautiful it is when we study the Bible more deeply? Friends, I invite you to join our Bible Study Groups in the parish. Youth and young adults can also join our Reveal Program. Realize that with the help of various fields such as anthropology, history, archaeology, to name a few, the story of Jesus is given more credibility and deeper meaning. We are able to ground our faith on knowledge. After all, St. Augustine reminds us, “I believe, in order to understand; and I understand, the better to believe.”