Dear Parish Family,
The word Epiphany comes from the Greek meaning “to appear” or “to be shown forth” According to the Catholic tradition, Epiphany signifies the first appearance of Christ to the gentiles in the story of the visit of the three wise men to the divine infant Jesus. As the three wise men represent all the known peoples of the world, this signifies an appearance to the entire world, not just a few who call themselves Christians. Some Eastern Churches celebrate this feast in bigger grandeur than Christmas because the New Born King is finally revealed.
 
We have exchanged gifts. We have swapped cards and eaten rich food and heard endless Christmas music both profane and sacred. May be we became emotional at listening to Silent Night in the dimmed-out Church at Christmas Eve Liturgy. Right now we might be tired getting all the decoration packed back into boxes again, though we have been reminded to keep them on a little while longer! And we come to the end of this whirlwind only to find the real question, the most important question, now waiting to be answered. Where is the one who is the reason for the season? Where is the newborn King of the Jews? Where do we find Christ?
 
Matthew’s Gospel offers us some surprise clues. Though He is King, he is not in a palace.  Christ is discovered in a simple house, where the magi “saw the child with Mary his mother.” The Gospel narrative on the Feast of the Mother of God, told us that the first visitors included shepherds—simple men who worked the fields and tended flocks. Christ is discovered among the humble, the overlooked, the marginalized, and the meek. Look among these, and you will find him.
 
Christ is discovered off the beaten path. He is in a small town that most people wouldn’t think about twice, Bethlehem. This most extraordinary of children is found among the most ordinary of people in the most ordinary of places—so ordinary that you have to “search diligently,” as Herod put it, to find him.
 
A star guides the way to the place where this new king is found. The point is clear: If you want to find him, follow that light. It’s difficult to do that in a world so often overcome by shadows and darkness. Especially now. Especially in a time when people are fearful and uncertain, terrified and terrorized. It was that way in Jesus’s time, as well. But look at where the magi found the son of God: in a forgotten corner of the world, among forgotten people, under a star. Beneath a pinpoint of light.
 
This is our Epiphany – our great discovery of God for our own time. He is made manifest to seekers in astonishing places, in astonishing ways. In our own time, he may be the child hungering for a warm meal or a warm home, or a single mother worried about her future. He may be found among those who are not near the centers of power: the elderly who have been forgotten, or the sick who have been neglected, or the weary and battered who feel alone and misunderstood. In one of my many meetings with Mother Teresa, as a young priest, I remember her telling us, ‘You touch the Body of Christ at the Eucharist and outside the Church, you must treat the broken body of Christ in the poor with equal respect.’ Can you make a ‘mental paradigm shift’ and practice kindness with everyone you meet without making any distinction. And then, like the magi, you will find our way home…by another way! The Christ Way! Your Epiphany!

  Fr. Thomas Kunnel C.O.