My Homily 4 Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord:

My Homily 4 Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord: Journeying with the Magi  

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Epiphany. The Old Testament makes it clear that God loves His people.  The Epiphany makes it clear that all who reverence God are His people.

On this feast, Vietnamese called magi the three Kings. Here in the US, we call them magi, or wise men. 

So, which were they?   They were probably all three.  The term magi refer to Persian priests who could interpret dreams, they were also astronomers and astrologers, people who looked for God’s message to humans in the stars. They were probably kings, because their arrival in Jerusalem earned them the respect from king Herod. They may have been leaders of various groups of people in the areas of Persia.  We really don’t know.  But we do know, that they were wise men. Who are attuned to the will of God and put it into action. They looked for the newborn King of the Jews. They assumed that Jesus was a mem0ber of the King’s family.  So, we could see why they thought king Herod would know where the baby Jesus was when they came to ask him. We can also understand why king Herod was upset.  The king realized that the magi brought him bad news and that there must be a threat to his kingship.  He is afraid someone out there who would take over his kingdom and be the new King of the Jews. 

Regarding the star, the ancients believed that the birth or death of a great person was accompanied by astral phenomena.  Perhaps the star was a comet.  Perhaps it was a supernova.  Or, perhaps, it was an angel guiding the magi not the star. 

Have you ever had any experience when you find your way in the woods by using stars from the sky?   One of my worst Boy Scout leader’s experience was 40 years ago. One Friday evening, we asked he parents to drop the boys off at the gate of the entrance to Wilderness area at Burk lake Park (40 years ago, the area at the corners of Burke Lake Rd and Fairfax County Parkway now was nothing but woods). And from there, we gave the boys the map and tell them to look for the North star to get to the campsite. Unfortunately, the campsite was only about 3 miles from the gate, but took them almost all-night to find the campsites. \It was the worst experience for me as a Scoutmaster.

So, for us we would prefer that star was an angel from God appearing to the magi and guided them to find Baby Jesus, the newborn King, and do Him homage to in the house in Bethlehem. 

Doing homage means to make an action of submission before a person of great dignity and authority.  A person would bow or prostrate himself.  Homage is the proper attitude of humans before God.  And we still continue this when we enter Church and genuflect before the Blessed Sacrament, or kneel during the Eucharistic Prayer and after receiving communion.  

The magi journeyed a long way and looked for the newborn King of the Jews to do him homage.  We also seek the Lord Jesus.  Why?  Why do we seek Jesus? We seek Him because we want Him to be our King.  We want Him to be the focus of our lives.  We are not satisfied with just calling upon Him when we need Him in times of crisis and challenge.  We don’t just call out to Jesus when a loved one is hurting, or has died, or when we have strife in our family, or when we need help at school or at work.  We call out to Him every day to be the center of our lives.  This takes courage and determination. 

It is easy for us to say, “Lord, I need you here in my life, but not there.  I need you in the hospital, but not when I’m going to a questionable party.”  It is easy for us to ask the Lord to be with us as we care for a sick person, but not with us when we go with a person with whom we sin.  We know that we can’t just call upon God some of the time, and ignore Him the rest of the time. 

We don’t want a God who will leave us alone so we can join in with the sin of the world.  We want a God who will help us conquer sin, conquer sin in the world and conquer sin in our lives.   And so, we also, like the magi, do him homage.  We prostrate ourselves before God and we proclaim with our hearts, with our words, and with our lives, “You are the Holy One.  You are our God.” Like the magi we have undertaken a journey. 

It is the journey of our life.   We journey to those places where the Lord is calling us to give witness to the world that He is the true King of the Universe. For our young people the places of their journey may include their schools, and those locations where they begin their adult lives. For our parents, the places of their journey may include each place their children need to go, each stage of their children’s lives. For each of us the places of our journeys include locations where people don’t usually go to look for God, like a stable, or a homeless shelter, or a prison or a rehab Center.

Few of us here today have ever been to Bethlehem. Those who visited that holy place found that the man ger was empty. But being a disciple of Jesus is not seeing him in the stable. It is living his gospel. Whenever we feed the poor, whenever we visit the sick or imprisoned, whenever we welcome the stranger, we are ministering to Christ himself.

We are serving Jesus. Our lives are a journey seeking the Presence of the Lord.  We journey with the magi to Bethlehem where we can find the Lord.  May our journey be safe, beautiful and full of the love of God.  We cannot go with the Magi to Bethlehem but we can offer Christ our gifts. Not gifts of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh but gifts of respect, compassion, and love.  May God give you and your families many blessings in this New Year.