Baptism of Jesus

Community dimension

The baptism of Jesus is a very significant event in the life of Jesus. Most of us may not rate it anywhere close to his miracles or passion or resurrection. Be it so, the baptism is still the beginning of his ministry. The voice of the father in the baptism is one of the initial recorded experiences of Jesus regarding his own identity. The father is well pleased with his son

We realise that this is much before the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. So the father is surely pleased either with his private life or he is pleased (in general) with this fellow, his son. I am inclined to think with the second reason, though the first one needn’t be thrown out.

We don’t need to limit the baptism scene there. The words uttered by the father are applicable to each of us, as we are the children of God, and not because of our saintliness or sinfulness. Or it is a free gift and assurance because of love. Love gives without counting the cost. Love can only give.

Now reflecting a little more based on contemporary situations, I would like to imagine three specific situations.

1. This baptism is not a planned event happening at a certain season and time. And the river Jordan can be any other river, not only big ones like Amazon or Nile or Ganga, but even small rivers or rivulets. But the difficulty is that, due to climate change and global warming, the river can be flooded or experiencing droughts. The timing of floods and droughts are quite unpredictable too. If you still need the baptism to occur at such times, we need the support of many more people who are helping and holding. Or the contemporary realities help us to realize in a profound way that listening to our identity uttered by God also has a communitarian or cosmic dimension. In the midst of creation, with the support of others, we realize our deepest identity, uttered not by anyone else but the father.
2. The baptizing personality — Jesus or John the Baptist — may not always be the young able-bodied fellows. They can be old, or physically challenged or have other difficulties. Again it affirms the point derived from the previous case, the communitarian dimension of this process of baptism.
3. We can ask whether these experiences, not once in a lifetime, but continuing experiences, can only happen in sacred rivers or in baptismal fonts or in the churches/chapels. Any place can be a locus for such an experience — be it a market place or pub, secluded or crowded places, in the presence of best friends or worst enemies — Abba can use all these loci to remind us that we are the beloved.

Our baptisms are mostly communitarian events — at least there are family and the priest/deacon. Our baptism or father’s revelation to us of our deepest identity is not a one day event, but a continuing event. And this happens not in isolation, or not in a world where I and Father alone exist, but in the community, a community of the children of the same father and community of the creation created by the same Father.