Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord Is 60:1-6 Ps 72: 1-2, 7-8, 10-11, 12-13 Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6 Mt 2:1-12

Weekly Guide for Daily Prayer The Daily Reflections Celebrating Christmas

When I was younger, in my hometown parish, our priest would always use the Epiphany celebration as an opportunity to mix things up at Sunday Mass- quite literally mix things up. Since the Wise Men had to travel a great distance to visit Jesus, it was our turn to do a little traveling as well. He would instruct everyone in the congregation to stand up, and physically move themselves from the spot they had chosen in the church to a spot as far away as possible. This was a great way to get people out of their usual location and on to someplace new, just as our faith sometimes takes us to uncharted territory.

Our Christian faith calls us to make the effort to make the inward journey to find ourselves. Think about it: though we all have lived with ourselves our entire lives, we can still know very little about who we are. What you know often focuses on your negative qualities, forgetting that “the glory of the Lord shines upon you.” We need to find Jesus in ourselves. The funny thing is, though you might expect a king to be in an ornate palace, He actually resides in the quiet town of Bethlehem. In our inner search, will He be in those things the material world values, or is He present in the quiet corners of our heart? The Wise Men had to go across their known world to find the King of Israel; are we willing to search the expanse of ourselves for our Savior?