If an epiphany is “a sudden and striking realization,” imagine how striking it is when God shows up with one, announcing from a cloud that “This is my beloved son.”
In Scripture, Epiphany also came as the Star of Bethlehem, the star that the three Magi, sometimes called kings or wise men, followed to the infant Jesus. That visit symbolizes the revelation of Christ to the peoples of the earth. It is celebrated on January 6 as the Feast of the Epiphany, and it kicks off a whole season.
This season of four to nine weeks lasts from the Feast of the Epiphany through the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. The length of the season varies according to the date of Easter, which is a moveable feast. Epiphany is a time when we are called to respond in faith through the showings of Jesus’ divinity as recorded in the gospel stories read during the Epiphany season.
The Baptism of Jesus, observed on the First Sunday after Epiphany, marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, and confirms his identity as the Son of God. The gospels for the other Sundays of the season describe a wedding feast at Cana, the calling of the Jesus’ disciples, and various miracles and teachings of Jesus.
The Last Sunday after the Epiphany is always devoted to the Transfiguration Gospel, in which Jesus’ identity as the Son of God is dramatically revealed. Peter, James, and John watch as Jesus is filled with the dazzling radiance of the presence of God, who proclaims again just as at Jesus’s Baptism that Jesus is God’s child, with whom God is well pleased. And then God’s voice commands, “Listen to him.”
God calls us to listen and act on the words of Jesus — to seek out the transfigured Christ in the world, to listen, and to respond in love, especially when other children of God are suffering, in need, persecuted, or subjected to injustices.
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