A man once came to Jesus to ask him the question. “What must I do to enter the kingdom of heaven?” Jesus told him, “You must be born again.” “But how,” the man asked. “can I become so small that I can crawl back into my mother’s womb?”
“Amen, amen, I say to you,” replied Jesus, “Unless you are born again by water and the Holy Spirit, you cannot have eternal life.”
Tonight, catechumen around the world will receive that new birth. After they renounced sin and professed their faith, they will be baptized. Blessed water will be poured over them with the words, “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
Several years ago, a friend invited me to witness the birth of her son. That was, needless to say, a moving experience. As any mother will tell you, the birth of a child involves more than just the pains of labor. For some, the pregnancy itself can be arduous. From what I was told, my mother endured quite a bit when she gave birth to me since I was breached. Afterwards, I was probably no picnic either!
A teacher once asked her second grade class what each wanted to be when they grew up. Her students replied, “A football player.” “A doctor.” “A policeman.” “A nurse.” “A teacher.” Everyone responded except Timmy, who sat rather quietly at his place.
So his teacher asked him, “Timmy, what do you want to be when you grow up?” “Possible, “Timmy replied. “”Possible?” asked the confused teacher. “What do you mean?”
“Well,” Timmy explained, “My mom is always telling me that I’m impossible. So when I get big, I want to be possible.”
By rising from the dead, Jesus Christ enables us to make possible in our lives all that he taught and lived throughout his brief earthly life: that love, compassion, generosity, humility and self-sacrifice will triumph over hatred, bigotry, prejudice, despair, greed and death. The empty tomb that we recall on Easter morning is the sign of perfect hope–that in Christ, all things are possible, that we can make of our lives what we want them to be, that we can become the people God created us to become.
Birth marks a new beginning for a child who has been growing in a mother’s womb, but as any parent knows, “We have only just begun.” The same is true for those who are baptized. However prepared they are for this moment, I cautioned parents and godparents that baptism is the beginning, not the end of a child’s faith journey with Jesus Christ. To Dina and to anyone else who is to be baptized, I’d say, “You have only just begun!”
Baptism can only happen once, just as we can only be born once. What all of us can do, as we witness another person’s baptism, is be fully open to the gift we received on the day of our own baptism, by opening wide our hearts to Christ and his message of new life. We will all have a chance to do that when we renew our baptismal vows.
Our baptism joins us to a very large family, the Catholic Church that shares the same sacraments, the same catechism, and the same Holy Father. Our ultimate goal in this life is to be part of that great communion of saints. The quest for new life may seem impossible at times but if we stick with Jesus and his Church, some day we will emerge from the womb of this world into that final rebirth, our own resurrection.