Second Sunday in Ordinary Time
January 16, 2022 Cycle C
by Rev. Jose Maria Cortes, F.S.C.B. Chaplain,
Saint John Paul II National Shrine,
 Washington, D.C.

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Sunday Reading Meditations

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

The Epiphany of the Lord, in addition to the Adoration of the Magi that we recently celebrated, actually also includes the Baptism of the Lord and the Wedding at Cana, all of which are moments in Jesus’ life that manifest God’s glory.

When John Paul II added the five Luminous Mysteries to the Rosary, he chose the Baptism of the Lord and the Wedding at Cana as the first two mysteries so that we could meditate upon them more often.

Through contemplation of the Mystery of the Wedding at Cana, we can come to understand the insufficiency of the human condition and how Jesus brings our human incompleteness to completion.

The wedding feast had started but the wine ran short. The lack of wine symbolizes our sense that something is always missing in our lives. Even if we could have anything, what we have is never enough. Are you fully satisfied with your life, circumstances, job and family? We always thirst for something else. We need more but that “more” can neither be achieved through our own efforts nor can another give it to us. This is our human condition.

However, Mary says to Jesus: “They have no wine.” Her statement spurs Jesus to act. God has compassion for us in our emptiness. He came to fill our emptiness with abundant life.

We are not alone in our sad fate. Jesus and Mary are present in the core of humanity. They are present at the feast where the wine is lacking, where the happiness is insufficient. There is hope! The wine at the wedding was of poor quality, like our lives without Christ.

“Do whatever he tells you.” The solution is to do what the Master tells us. The servers prepare the jars with water. Jesus’ miracle requires our contribution, even when we can only give water, a substance without color or taste. From our nothing, God can make everything happen.

The miracle happened and the headwaiter was amazed at the quality of the new wine. Instead of starting with the good wine and later serving wine of inferior quality, the usual order was reversed!

If we do what Jesus tells us, a miracle happens: we move from the least to the most. There is absolute positivity in following Christ.

Modern culture errs by attempting to separate God from our happiness. Many times we think that what God asks from us is detrimental to our interests. Nothing is further from the truth!

Let us ask Our Lady of Cana to obtain for us the grace of experiencing how Jesus truly brings our human incompleteness to completion.  Amen.