Paul Knitter’s Homily from Jan. 12, 2025

You Are My Beloved
Jan 12, 2025 – The Baptism of Jesus
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

1. I have to first confess that I’m going to do a little cheating in today’s homily.
   • I’m going to let two contemporary spiritual writers do much of the talking this morning.
   • One is a Christian, familiar to some of you. The other is a Buddhist – or a Christian Buddhist.
   • I think that what each of them has to say about today’s Gospel reading enhances the other and so together can help us find deeper meaning in this text.
2. The first is Leonardo Boff, a Brazilian liberation theologian who back in 1985 received the distinction of being silenced for one year by then Cardinal Josef Ratzinger (after which the sale of his books went up markedly.)
   • In his latest book, published just a few months ago and cutely titled Jesus and His Abba: A Little Christology, Boff sees Jesus’ baptism as the moment when Jesus had a deep, transforming religious experience.
   • “It was precisely at this moment that Jesus came to the full and lucid awareness of being the beloved Son of the Father/Mother. A torrent of spiritual love invaded his whole being and radically transformed his life.” 44
   • “From that moment on, the ‘conversion’ of Jesus took place, a true revolution in his life. He felt that he was the beloved Son of the beloved God-Abba. He is invaded by a passion of divine love, by a parental tenderness that took hold of his whole life. He experienced directly the lovingkindness of God, a presence so powerful that it affected his whole being, his whole consciousness, and his whole existence.  He became another. Whoever calls God ‘Father/Mother’ logically feels that he/she is God’s son/daughter.” 50
   • So, for Boff, the Baptism in the Jordan River was the moment when Jesus really “woke up” to who he really was and began his public ministry of sharing this Abba-love with others.
   • “Recall that ‘Spirit’ is the same word as ‘Breath’ (ruah in Hebrew, pneuma in Greek). Immersed in water and in the mystery of Breath, a voice from the depths is heard in the stillness: ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased. “I invite us to stay in that silence, to listen deeply, in the very depths of our own being, paying close attention to the breath. We may also hear the message, You are my beloved. With you I am well pleased.” 105
   • “As we sit quietly and allow our attention to be centered on the Breath, and as we immerse ourselves in its Mystery, our hearts may be opened to hear that same voice that addressed Jesus, and hear it also addressed to each of us as well, each in our own unique ways. This is the voice of Unconditional Love, affirming me, allowing me to be who I am as I am, filled with the confidence that I am loved just as I am, no matter what.” P. 106
   • Habito believes that there is a similarity, if not identity, between Jesus’ experience of being God’s beloved and the Zen experience of enlightenment in which one wakes up to one’s true nature.
   • And this leads Habito to assure Christians that what Jesus experienced can be their experience.
   • That we can experience what Jesus experienced? That sounds a bit audacious, maybe unorthodox.
   • But, really, what Habito is suggesting should be nothing new for Christians. He is confirming something we hear – but perhaps have never really heard – in the NT writings of John and Paul.
   • In his first Letter, John makes the astonishing announcement: “See what great love the Father/Mother has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God. And that is what we are!”  (1 John 3:1)
3. The second spiritual writer that I want us all to hear from is actually a good friend of mine: Ruben Habito, an ordained Zen Roshi or priest and former Jesuit, now teaching at Southern Methodist University. Ruben understands our text from his Zen experience and practice. In his book Zen and the Spiritual Exercises (of St. Ignatius), he tells us:
   • “Recall that ‘Spirit’ is the same word as ‘Breath’ (ruah in Hebrew, pneuma in Greek). Immersed in water and in the mystery of Breath, a voice from the depths is heard in the stillness: ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.
     “I invite us to stay in that silence, to listen deeply, in the very depths of our own being, paying close attention to the breath. We may also hear the message, You are my beloved. With you I am well pleased.” 105
   • “As we sit quietly and allow our attention to be centered on the Breath, and as we immerse ourselves in its Mystery, our hearts may be opened to hear that same voice that addressed Jesus, and hear it also addressed to each of us as well, each in our own unique ways. This is the voice of Unconditional Love, affirming me, allowing me to be who I am as I am, filled with the confidence that I am loved just as I am, no matter what.” P. 106
   • Habito believes that there is a similarity, if not identity, between Jesus’ experience of being God’s beloved and the Zen experience of enlightenment in which one wakes up to one’s true nature.
   • And this leads Habito to assure Christians that what Jesus experienced can be their experience.
4. That we can experience what Jesus experienced? That sounds a bit audacious, maybe unorthodox.
   • But, really, what Habito is suggesting should be nothing new for Christians. He is confirming something we hear – but perhaps have never really heard – in the NT writings of John and Paul.
   • In his first Letter, John makes the astonishing announcement: “See what great love the Father/Mother has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God. And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1)
     • And in his Gospel John relates the prayer of Jesus: “I pray…that all of them may be one, Father/Mother, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us….” John 17: 23
   • We hear this same message from Paul.
     • When Paul announces to the Romans “All who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God” (Rom 8:14),when he reminds the Galatians that “in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith,” (Gal. 3:26),and when he calls upon the Philippians, as children of God, “to put on the mind of Christ (Phil. 2:4),
     • Paul is declaring that they are brothers and sisters with Jesus and can share in the very experience of Jesus Christ – that Christ can continue being the Beloved of God in them. 
5. But you might be asking: how can I know this is true? How can I know, as Jesus knew, that I am God’s “beloved,” that I am held in the loving Mystery that we Christians, Jews and Muslims call “God”?
   • I suggest that we can know this is true by trusting that this is true.  Trust enables us to know. You might say: Try it, you’ll like it.
     • This is why all the Christian mystics, as well as the Buddhist mystics, tell us that to experience God or Holy Mystery, to experience Nirvana or Enlightenment, we have to let go, to let go of our usual way of thinking and knowing, and let ourselves sink silently and trustingly into the unconditional Love that holds us and keeps us in existence.  This is a way of knowing, not with our heads, but with our heart.
   • So, if we want to nurture and deepen our trusting awareness that we are Beloved of God, it is helpful – maybe even essential – to set aside some time every day when we can sit in silence and allow ourselves to abide in and to be held by this Loving Presence that Jesus called Abba.
     • One of the most practical ways of doing this is through the Christian meditation practice of Centering Prayer, in which, as many of you know, we try to quiet our thoughts in order to abide silently in God’s presence and love.There are Centering Prayer groups that meet here at Holy Wisdom on Wednesdays, sometimes in the evening, sometimes in the afternoon.  Also, anyone can join the sisters in their Centering Prayer during the morning or evening liturgies of the hours.
     • You can also join Centering Prayer groups online. They’re available on Meditationchapel.org.
   • But Centering Prayer and adapted forms of Zen meditation may not be helpful for everyone. What can work for all Christians – what is the primary and perhaps most effective way of feeling and experiencing our oneness with Jesus as beloved daughters and sons of Abba – is what we gather for in this Assembly Room every Sunday: The Sacrament of the Eucharist.
     • This sacrament, this symbolic ritual, in calling us to break and share bread together and to remember Jesus, invites us and enables us to feel that this Jesus Christ continues to live in and as us, to share with us his experience of being God’s beloved daughter or son.
     • Today after Communion, we’ll sit in silence for a few minutes to allow ourselves, as Ruben Habito suggested, to hear with the ears of our heart the voice that tells us “You, you, are my beloved daughter, my beloved son.”

Let us proceed now to break bread together and to remember who Jesus is and who we are.

Paul Knitter