Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Welcome back.
[00:00:08] It's Sunday, January 11th, the Feast of the baptism of the Lord and our final day of reflection this season.
[00:00:27] In the Uffizi Gallery in Florence is a famous painting of John the Baptist baptizing Jesus in the Jordan.
[00:00:35] Don Simone, abbot of the monastery of San Salvi in Florence, Italy, asked his brother Andre del Verrocchio to paint a famous scene.
[00:00:47] Verrocchio, a sculptor, painter and goldsmith, completed some of the baptism of Christ, but he assigned two of his apprentices, including Leonardo da Vinci, to finish it.
[00:01:01] The oil and tempera painting, completed around 1475, shows John baptizing Jesus as two angels kneel in adoration.
[00:01:13] In the painting, halos rest on Jesus and John.
[00:01:17] A dove descends from above with rays of light shining down on Jesus, symbolizing the Holy Spirit and Jesus divine nature.
[00:01:28] A scroll by John's left hand shows two Latin words, es agnus, that refer to a Latin translation of John 1:29.
[00:01:40] Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
[00:01:46] In all likelihood, Leonardo painted the angel on the far left of Christ as well as some of the background landscape.
[00:02:08] Today, on the feast of the baptism of the Lord and the last day of the Christmas season, Catholics are reminded of their own baptism and their baptismal promises.
[00:02:20] But what does the baptism of the Lord tell us?
[00:02:24] Imagine this.
[00:02:26] I'm asked to write down in one sentence my response to the question, what is a Christian?
[00:02:34] My first inclination might be to write down something about how Christians act or what we do, don't do.
[00:02:42] But the proper answer would have to be, a Christian is someone who is baptized and believes Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
[00:02:52] The story of the baptism of Jesus is placed at the beginning of Jesus public ministry in all four gospels.
[00:03:01] It's placed there because that is the starting point.
[00:03:04] This is the story of the revelation of who Jesus is.
[00:03:09] The Son of God.
[00:03:11] That's why the Church celebrates the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord at the conclusion of the Christmas season and the beginning of the rest of the liturgical year.
[00:03:23] I can't go anywhere in my life as a Christian unless I understand first of all that I am what I am, because I am baptized and I believe that Jesus Christ is. Is the Son of God, period.
[00:03:44] Let us spend some quiet time with the Lord.
