2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time

We Christians love the Christmas Season, because it allows us to dwell on the story of the Nativity and those first special moments in the life of Jesus and the Holy Family.  For as much as we love these stories, however, they’re not that important in the larger narrative.  Mark and John don’t even mention these moments in their Gospels because they didn’t find them relevant to their telling of the story.  The infancy narratives are like the hors d’oeuvres of Christian scripture – something to whet our appetites for the larger story to come, which begins now as we leave Christmastide behind and enter into Ordinary Time.

The Word for the 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time
1 Samuel 3:3b-10, 19
Psalm 40:2, 7-8, 8-9, 10
1 Corinthians 6:13c-15a, 17-20
John 1:35-42

We ended the Christmas season with the celebration of the Baptism of the Lord, a moment that marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.  Jesus’ baptism by John is a passing of the torch, an acceptance of his divine mission and the beginning of a journey that literally changed the world.

Receiving a great calling is a theme that we see over and over in Scripture.  Our first reading gives us one such account from the 1st book of Samuel.  Samuel was the last of the great Judges in Israel before the monarchy.  Before he became a great prophet and judge, however, he was just a boy who had been taken under the tutelage of Eli, the high priest of Shiloh (and the second-last Judge of Israel).  Today’s passage is the story of how Samuel was called by God.  It is a pivotal moment not only for Samuel, but one that will forever change Israel as we know her.

Just as Samuel answered God’s call, our Gospel shows the first disciples of Jesus answering his call.  in a passage from John’s Gospel, John the Baptist sees Jesus go by and he proclaims “Behold, the Lamb of God.”  At this calling Andrew and another disciple come immediately forward to follow Jesus.  Andrew is so excited that he goes to find his brother Simon to bring him to Jesus, whereupon Jesus names him Peter.

As is typical with Ordinary Time, the intent of our second reading isn’t so much to complement the themes found in our first reading and the Gospel, but rather gives us an opportunity to study some of epistles at length.  For these next few weeks of Ordinary Time, we will be focused on passages from Paul’s 1st Letter to the Corinthians.  In today’s passage, Paul tells us that our very bodies are for the Lord.  That they are in fact, temples for the Spirit, and as such, we should use our bodies accordingly.  Not for immoral acts, but to the service of the Lord and the greater body of Christ.  We can also see in this passage the beginnings of Paul’s teachings on the Body of Christ.

Final Thoughts:
The people in our readings this week all have something in common – they’ve been called by God.  Today this type of “calling” is often synonymous with the word vocation, which comes from the latin vocar, which means “to call”, and vocatia, which means “summons”.  It is also the root of words like vocalize and voice.  While the word vocation has certain meaning for us Catholics as a call to ordination or to the vows of religious life, it also has a similar secular meaning with regard to one’s occupation, profession or way of life.  A vocation is something that comes from beyond ourselves, yet at the same time, is an intimate part of ourselves.  Marriage and living the married life is also a vocation within the Church.  It’s more than just committing yourself to another person, but together committing themselves (and any children) to that vocation.  What makes family life a vocation is the need to propagate the Gospel, preserving the Church and ensuring the future of the Church through the next generation so that the story of Jesus and the message of the Gospel continues.