Second Sunday In Ordinary Time C

January 19, 2025

John 2: 1-11

What would surprise us more today than Jesus beginning his public ministry at a wedding reception? Maybe at a Superbowl party? But we are missing the point. Jesus begins his ministry in the middle of a joyful celebration of two people beginning their lives together. It is true that we might have expected Jesus and his disciples to begin by teaching in the streets or feeding the poor or healing the sick. They were not in prayer or solitude or fasting. No, they were at a wedding, sharing on this wonderful occasion with a married couple, and probably most of the village.

Doesn’t this look ahead to the most solemn and intimate way we can relate to Jesus today, the Eucharist? And not only is there a celebration of life, but a miracle of changing water into wine. Wine, which will become such an important part of our ability to be close to Jesus right now. It is just this kind of thing that all through Jesus’ ministry his critics would use to call him a wine bibber and a drunkard. Yes, Jesus is to be found during all kinds of people and in all life situations.

Jesus came to make something new, that is for certain. We can see it in the method he chooses to give more wine when it has run out. There must have been any number of empty wine jars laying around the banquet hall. And yet, Jesus used jars full of water that observant Jews used to purify themselves before they ate or drank. It was part of the Law Moses had given.

The thing we must know is that because these jars had such a special use, they were never, ever used to hold anything else. That was unheard of; if they were used to holding things other than pure water, the jars could never be used for purification again. By this action, Jesus was showing that he was replacing the waters of Judaism with the wine of Christianity. Jesus was transforming how we relate to God.

It is said that the writer Leo Tolstoy experienced that kind of transformation. He told about it in a book titled, My Conversion. Tolstoy wrote, “[When] Faith came to me, I believed in Jesus Christ, and all my life suddenly changed. I ceased to desire what I had desired, and on the other hand, I took to desiring what I had never desired before. That which formerly used to appear good in my eyes appeared evil and that which used to appear evil appeared good.” Before his conversion, Tolstoy had acquired fame and fortune through his great writings. But he was dissatisfied. “I fought duels,” he wrote. “I gambled, I wasted my substance, wrung from the sweat of peasants and deceived men. Lying, robbery, adultery of all kinds, drunkenness was my life.” His conversion, one of the most dramatic of modern times, gave his life a new purpose, a new meaning and, he affirmed, an abiding satisfaction. Many millions of people over the centuries have experienced that kind of transformation at the hand of Christ. The miracle of Cana gives us that lesson.

So, in today’s gospel, Jesus points us in a new direction. During all the important things of life, like fasting, preaching and teaching, feeding the poor or giving comfort to the sick and dying, we make time to remember each other in all aspects of life. Jesus is present in all; and we experience him in celebration like in the sacraments, in taking time for people in every part of life, as well as in teaching or giving comfort in physical and spiritual ways. No matter the setting, it is God’s love and compassion that we are to reflect to all. Any setting of life can be a transformation and can be an opportunity to turn our lives around. Just as Jesus at the marriage feast of Cana was showing that he was replacing the waters of Judaism with the wine of Christianity.

By: Fr. John Tran