by Fr. Rich Andre, C.S.P.
January 8, 2024

Paulist Fr. Rich Andre preached this homily on the Solemnity of the Epiphany on January 7, 2024 at The Paulist Center in Boston, MA. The homily is based on the day’s readings: Isaiah 60:1-6; Psalm 72; Ephesians 3:2-3a, 5-6; and Matthew 2:1-12.

Almost everyone is familiar with the story of the Epiphany. Some Persian astrologers – whose number and gender are not specified by Matthew, despite numerous popular carols and Nativity scenes – become the first non-Jewish people to recognize Jesus as the Messiah.

Today, I’m struck by the contrast in the sizes of things in the Christmas story. As the Reverend Charles Haddon Spurgeon preached in London in 1857: “The Infinite has become an infant; he, upon whose shoulders the universe doth hang, hangs at his mother’s breast; He who created all things, and bears up the pillars of creation, hath now become so weak, that He must be carried by [another human being]!”¹ On today’s feast, we celebrate that wealthy astrologers traveled great distances as directed by heavenly bodies, to have an epiphany – which, on a chemical level, is simply the sparking of a particular synapse in the brain.

In this new year, we pray that each of us will have epiphanies of our own, recognizing that God, creator of the universe, intimately loves us, just as we are!

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I know many wise men and wise women. As a former optical engineer, I’m friends with several people who worked on the James Webb Space Telescope. Webb is radically altering our understanding of the universe. For the past year and a half, it has provided us with a treasure trove of data to refine our theories about how stars and galaxies are formed. 

For much of the previous 3 decades, however, it wasn’t clear if Webb would ever be built. And if ever was built, it was unclear if it would work. As scientists and engineers designed Webb in the 1990s, they needed to invent new technologies. The cost overruns and schedule delays on the project were legendary. Over Webb’s long, arduous history, Congress repeatedly threatened to stop funding it. The costs for this literally astronomical project were figuratively astronomical. Should the government be spending so much money on this risky venture?

It was on Christmas Day of 2021 that Webb launched heavenward. It took 29 days to reach its destination, roughly 1 million miles from earth. After the launch, this engineering marvel had to go through more than six months of complex operations before it could begin sending us high-quality images. Scientists were understandably anxious as Webb went through each of 344 mechanical operations that were considered “single-point failures” that could not be fixed if anything went wrong. 

If we use our imaginations, we can construct some odd parallels between the journey of the Webb Telescope and the journey of the magi. Family and friends may have shaken their heads and thought that the magi’s long, arduous journey was impractical. There may have been plenty of Persians who protested that the magi had given lavish gifts to a displaced Jewish family in a foreign land, instead spending that money on food and shelter for needy people closer to home.

Our own journeys of faith may have some parallels to the endeavors of the magi and the Webb Telescope, too. Like the magi of old and the astronomers of today, we sometimes need to head towards a goal in faith and hope, not sure what we will experience when or if the full glory of God is revealed to us. Sometimes, we have to do something extraordinary in order to perceive something right in front of us, to gain an insight that allows our neurons to make new, life-giving connections. But at other times, we can make such extraordinary connections simply by contemplating the ordinary. As quantum physics tell us: the very act of observing something changes its reality!

Matthew presents Jesus’ birth as setting up a clash between what he calls “the kingdom of heaven” and “the kingdom of earth.” When they first arrived in the Holy Land, the magi went to Herod’s opulent palace to find the newborn king… but he was not there. When they arrived in Bethlehem, they found an entirely different type of ruler of an entirely different kind of realm, a realm beyond their imagination and reason, created by the One who created us all at the dawn of time, and who was now breaking through time and space to become like us. For the magi, everything changed right then. They could no longer sleep soundly, but they began to dream. And their dreams changed the direction of their lives.

It’s not just Persian astrologers and billion-dollar telescopes that go on fantastic journeys. We, too, can encounter extraordinary new ideas that change the direction of our lives. We discover new things all the time. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been praying for quite a while for some divine intervention, to help the neurons in my brain make new connections, to make my day-to-day existence simpler and richer.

Like those Persian astrologers of old, may we dare to be surprised by Jesus, who continually calls us to open our hearts. May we witness the glory of the One who “bears up the pillars of creation.” May we experience the love of God’s only-begotten Son dwelling among us. And may we be joyfully inspired to frequently make new connections, occasionally change directions… and never stop dreaming.