We have just put an end to the Incarnation Season of Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, and Baptism of the Lord. We now enter Ordinary Time. As I have written before, “ordinary” does not mean commonplace or routine. Ordinary refers to ordinal numbers. We are counting the Sundays of the year. This Sunday is the Second Sunday in Ordinary Time. “Wait a minute, what happened to the First Sunday in Ordinary Time,” you may ask. There isn’t one because the Monday after the Baptism of the Lord is Monday of the First Week of Ordinary Time. The next Sunday begins the Second Week of Ordinary Time. Confused? That’s okay. There is no quiz coming up.
We will be in Ordinary Time this year from Monday, Jan 12 to Tuesday, Feb 17. Ash Wednesday is Feb 18 beginning the Paschal Season of Lent, Easter, Pentecost.
We are in Cycle A this year, which means most Sundays will have a Gospel reading from the Gospel of Matthew. (Year B is Mark and Year C is Luke). However, just to prove me wrong, this Sunday the Gospel is John 1:29-34. The passage occurs soon after Jesus is baptized by John. John gives witness to Jesus as the “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” These words of John the Baptist will be echoed by us today at Mass when we sing the Lamb of God just before Holy Communion. We will ask Jesus to have mercy on us and to grant us peace. When you sing this prayer Sunday, consider John’s witness of Jesus as the one who will baptize us with the Holy Spirit.
The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity begins this Sunday. What would our world be like if all Christians were united? Can you dream about a time when all people who profess to be Christian would love as Jesus taught us to love? We are a long way from that heaven on earth, but let us pray that divisions would narrow (or cease to exist?) for Christians and for our relations with peoples of other faith traditions as well.