The Birthday of John the Baptist (2018)

You have probably noticed that in Hebrew poetry

It is common to put similar sentiments side by side

so that they can affect each other.

You see this all the time in the psalms

and abundantly in the first stanza of today’s responsorial psalm.

you search me and you know me,

you know my resting and my rising,

you discern my purpose from afar.

You mark when I walk or lie down,

all my ways lie open to you.

This is a good example of the phenomenon,

though, in my opinion,

not one where it provides much additional depth.

The first reading today is the second of four poems,

called the servant songs,

found in the middle part of the book of Isaiah.

This one seems to be based in the prophet’s own experience.

Here we learn quite a lot from appreciating

a couple of lines as Hebrew poetry,

for the poetry adds depth and density.

The Lord called me before I was born,

from my mother’s womb he pronounced my name.

Feel the effect of putting

The Lord called me and he pronounced my name

together – allow the sentiments to affect each other.

The Lord called me:

That call is by name, to me individually, personally;

He pronounced my name:

my name, my very self, is a word from God,

by which God calls me for His work.

The prophet knows that ‘who he is’

both comes from God

and is a call from God.

The poem reaches past its own time and circumstances.

It resonates with, and prepares for, what comes later.

We can read it fairly directly as

‘for’ John the Baptist,

‘for’ Jesus himself,

and indeed ‘for’ the Church.

Today, in the liturgy, we have the poem ‘for’ John the Baptist.

John who, before he was born, was called and named;

called personally to

go ahead of the Lord and prepare his ways before Him.

But John also represents all that has gone before

in preparing the way for Jesus:

all the history,

all the writers of biblical books,

all the prophets,

all the holy men and women.

In our Eucharist today

we give thanks for God’s working in John the Baptist

and in everybody before him who prepared humanity

for Jesus’ time on earth, for all who went

ahead of the Lord and prepare his ways before Him.

These lines from the poem also speak to us directly,

saying that, for each one of us,

our very selves and our sense of self

are both a gift and a calling from God.

The choice of responsorial psalm points in this direction.

It could make a fitting personal prayer after communion today.

In faith, we are all to say:

The Lord called me before I was born,

from my mother’s womb he pronounced my name.

…..

and then, with the psalmist, we pray

I thank you for the wonder of my being.