These words ring out like a noontime bell in today’s reading from the Prophet Isaiah. Isaiah goes on to declare the reason for this proclamation, and the details of what this truth will look like and sound like.
This Sunday that begins the Second Week in Ordinary Time, Jesus is revealed to be the fulfillment of prophecy, and what that looks and sounds like. It is not what might have been expected. Accepting the prompting of his Mother to tend to the concerns of a wedding host and troubling himself with water and wine … seems quite ordinary by worldly measure. We can think the same of Ordinary Time … flat, “blah” after the glitz and glamour of Christmas. Not so. The “ordinary” of this season comes from its “ordo” or “order” given it by the continuing unfolding of the Mystery of Christ. It remains a time in which not to be silent.
During the coming week the Church prays for a rediscovery of the faith and practice that can recover the fullness of Christian Unity. Every day Christians of good faith are together and collaborate in good works to serve the needs of all, needs great and small. Whether we are able to gather in ecumenical moments of prayer to this end or simply raise up our prayers for one another, we can and we must. Also during this week we will recall the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr. There are divisions among us as Christians that are part of the legacy of our history affected forever by the Reformation. There also are divisions among us that are the results of centuries of racial disparities and perceptions of difference as superiority/ inferiority. And those disparities and perceptions are not confined to race. It just happens to be a profound issue in our society and culture to this very day. Let’s make this time far from ordinary!