January 5, 2025

Solemnity of the Epiphany

Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:2-3, 5-6; Matthew 2:1-12

A British educator named Sir Ken Robinson told a story of three children who played the role of the magi at their kindergarten nativity play. They came on stage carrying their gifts. The first boy laid his box before the baby Jesus and announced, “I have brought you gold.” The second laid his box down and announced, “I have brought you myrrh.” Now the third boy came down with sudden stage fright, but he had to say something, so he bravely said, “Frank, Frank sends this.” [Thanks to Msgr. Joseph Pellegrino for the idea of this joke.]

Now Saint Matthew is silent on the names of the magi, but tradition has always given them the names Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar, but who knows? Maybe one was nicknamed Frank, or maybe had a boss named Frank. Matthew uses the term magi, who were astronomers, and therefore may or may not have been kings, and Matthew is also silent on the number. Tradition has stepped in and provided more detail to a story that doesn't have but some bare-bones facts. But Matthew does tell us one important detail about the magi: they were seeking something. To use the words of Father Tom McCarthy, they were on a restless journey. If you attended our Advent mission, you heard some excellent talks from Farther Tom on what it means to be on a restless journey to be the best person we can be, to be all that God created us to be. The magi knew what Father Tom reminded us, and we should also know if we want to be wise, that if we stay where we are, we will never get to where we could be. And so we are presented today, as we start this new year with new resolutions to change and become better, with role models for seeking out what is good in life, seeking to better understand their world, seeking out God.

But, you will say, the magi were seeking a newborn king and not God. They didn’t know that it was God that they would find. While that may be technically true, if we disassociate God from their quest we have missed an important point of this story. They want to understand the world better, and therefore they looked to the skies at night as well as pursued leads for information where it led them. For to know creation better is to know the Creator better. Our Church has always taught that, by observing the natural order of things, we will understand better the God who designed that order. And our Gospel not only presents us with one group that is restless to know more, but it also presents and compares them with a second group who do the opposite; one that is complacent and think they already know everything they need to know – about the world, about God, about what is important. They are not on a restless journey but are instead complacent.

The chief priests and the scribes in the Gospel were not astrologers, and therefore one could state with some certitude that they may not have noticed the star at its rising. However, after the magi stopped in Jerusalem, they now knew. And what did they do with that knowledge? Not a thing. Even the power-hungry Herod, despite being troubled, sat around letting the magi do his leg work to find the child. They couldn’t be bothered. Now, you need to know that Bethlehem is less than ten miles from Jerusalem. This was probably a hard one-day journey at the time of Jesus due to the state of the roads and need to protect oneself against bandits. But it still was not that hard a journey. So while the Gospel is silent on the reaction of the chief priests and scribes, once you notice their inaction, it speaks volumes as to their mindset. You know that they are not on a restless journey.

So this brings us back to the question that Fr. Tom asked us during our Advent Mission: are we restless to know God better? Are we climbing a tree like Zacchaeus, trying to find Jesus, finding ways of seeking the will of God in our lives [Luke 19:1-10]? Are we like Samuel, listing for the voice of God and responding with “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening” [1 Samuel 3:9 NABRE]? Are we like any of Father Tom's many examples of people who saw a problem and did something to address it. What I personally liked was that his examples of people on restless journeys were not saints, or at least not officially recognized and canonized saints. Even the saints that I personally like and admire a lot, like St. Teresa of Calcutta or St. Francis, can seem on such a different plane of existence from where my day-to-day life is that it is hard to see the applications of their lives to mine. However, to name just one of Father Tom’s examples, he mentioned the family that saw the need to help fund a special needs community after the birth of a sibling with an intellectual disability. They opened a lemonade stand after Mass at their church and raised tens of thousands of dollars by making the cause of their sister Molly and people like her into one that the parish took on as well.

So we are back to Frank the magi, or whatever his name was. He saw a star and wanted to know more about it. He felt like it was important and wanted to find out what it really meant. He was restless to understand his world better. So too are we as Christians tasked to bring the good news to others. For those of you who were not able to attend our Advent mission, Father Tom challenged us to be like the magi and be restless about what we see and what is our part in it. Let’s not be like the chief priests and scribes, arrogant, complacent, believing they had it all figured out. Jesus left us his Holy Spirit, and today's Gospel calls us to listen to that Spirit, to explore the signs that God gives us in our lives, to see where they lead, to find out what they mean, to determine our roll in the unfolding creation that is our world. Our restless journey must only end when our life ends, for it is only then that we will have the full knowledge of God. Until then, we journey on.

As we continue with our Mass, may the Eucharist we receive give us spiritual nourishment for the great journey that is life in Christ. Let us resolve never to be complacent but to seek ways to bring this world closer to the kingdom of God. May this new jubilee year bring all of us closer to that kingdom of peace, joy, and mercy. Then we will be like that great saint, Augustine, who summarized his life's journey with the famous line from his autobiography: “Our hearts are restless [O God] until they find rest in you.” [ https://www.vatican.va/spirit/documents/spirit_20020821_agostino_en.html ]