By WEENA S. MEILY, AWIT
Isaiah 60:1-6
Psalm 72:1-2, 7-8, 10-11, 12-13.
Ephesians 3:2-3a, 5-6
Matthew 2:1-12
When the album Folklore was released on July 2020, it was just months after Covid 19 affected the entire world. Taylor Swift isolated herself in those days, but aloneness proved to be fertile ground for a revelation. One song stood out among those included in the album. In this poetic, lyrical piece, Swift “empathizes with doctors and nurses, who served the affected despite their harrowing work, and mental trauma they have to experience while handling the loss of human lives.” The song is Epiphany and it reached the top 50 single charts across the globe. I was touched by the meaning behind the song. And what an epiphany it must have been for Swift whose music as well as poetry has captured the hearts of millions around the world. Her epiphany was a deep revelation, at a time of solitude, isolation and probable loneliness, at a time when the world isolated itself from everybody else. Epiphany here is a manifestation of something that one needed to know so that growth may flourish in the light of truth-seeking. An Epiphany is not only an “aha! moment”. It is life-changing. It moves us to conversion, to begin again.
Let’s go back further to a time when the known world was suffering from the brutal hands of Empire. Conquests of land creeping fast into the Near East, it was a time when colonizing was the norm for the powerful and oppression was for the powerless. And in the midst of all these, a king is born. So it was told to the Magi. And they needed to know. Who is this king? Where is he born? Why is his birth so much awaited? They must have asked. These Magi were intellectuals, persons of science. There is no biblical basis for the number three, except for mentioning about three gifts given, gold, frankincense and myrrh. Some theologians would suggest there were more with them and that some were women. What does the Gospel writer (Matthew 2:1-12) mean about Epiphany?
The First Reading, in Isaiah 60:1-6, writes a familiar line every Christmastide specifically on the Epiphany: “Arise…for your light has come…Night still covers the earth…but Yahweh now rises…Nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your dawn” (CCB, 2010) With a hopeful heart this light shines amidst the dark side of all that is on the earth. Today we experience all kinds of crises. Where is the light? In the gospel, as the Magi arrived, Matthew records them also asking, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:2) The Magi were truth seekers. They want to know. Knowledge was their life. They had followed signs in the skies and have asked for prophecies and consulted Jewish writings about the location of this child-king. And so it was revealed to them, in the book of Micah, that “…in Bethlehem…will come…one who is ruler over Israel…”
Truth-seeking. We are all seekers. As the Magi were, so we are. We are faced today with a world overloaded with information, fake news, and artificial intelligence. The Magi in their time knew about the turmoil brought about by Empire. And they knew Israel was to have a savior to liberate them from the hands of oppression. And so they had to find this would-be ruler of Israel. It is indeed a wonder that
“people who are seekers first experience unusual events that point to a greater reality. The Magi did not know the scriptures, but they had the wisdom to recognise the signs of the times. They noted the constellations and God also spoke to them in dreams.” (Rev.Scott Brennan, Holy Island, Lindisfarne, UK) What does this mean? God begins where we are when He draws us to a revelation in so many forms as we seek truth. God used the stars, in the case of the Magi, and drew them towards the truth of the birth of the Messiah.
How are we, as a people, being drawn by God through our collective-seeking, towards the truth of the times? We are at the portals of the next half of a decade, ushering in a new beginning, living our ordinary lives in the midst of crises after crises. We are invited by this beginning to muster our efforts to discern the stirrings of the Spirit of justice as the poor struggles deeper into the quagmire of poverty. Pushed into the fringes of society and dragged into the abyss of deception and distortion, the people continue to suffer…
“The Marcos Jr. Administration’s budget clearly shows its distorted priorities. It’s so easy for it to find hundreds of billions of pesos for pork barrel projects and infrastructure to make the rich richer. But the people have to beg and struggle for every precious peso for education, health, housing and ayuda that they’re entitled to as a matter of right and that the government should give as a matter of obligation.” (Sonny Africa, Executive Director, IBON Foundation, Inc. December 31, 2024; Read more: www.ibon.org )
A reveal of numbers and the reality of things happening in society and in government are that which we as a people experience our own collective Epiphany. As we seek more and know more about our national situation, we begin to see the light that reveals what lies in darkness. Kailangan natin mag-alam. Kailangang tayo ay maki-alam, makiisa at makibaka kasama ang mga mahihirap. Dahil sa pamamagitan lamang ng mahihirap, at sa pakikisama sa mahihirap tayo ay makakakita ng Liwanag na aaninag galing sa Espirito ng Katarungan. (We need to know. We need to get involved, and be one with the struggles of the poor. Because only with the poor will we be able to see the light of the Spirit of Justice.) The Christ-child was born poor, lived poor and died in poverty. Yes, it was not an easy life, but that is the life this Epiphany is inviting us to embrace.
For Taylor Swift it was a time to learn empathy and hold the suffering of healthcare persons as her own; and for us, as a people collectively seeking and struggling to understand our Epiphany, we shift our narrative from “a people walking in darkness” to “a people who have seen the light.”
We continue to follow the star that guided the shepherds and the humble Magi from the East towards the Christ-child. We continue to follow the star that will guide us to forge our own paths in the wilderness towards that enlightened way leading us “to worship the Christ-child who comes to us in vulnerability and accessibility.” We continue to follow the star that leads us towards a life of compassion for and solidarity with the poor and those marginalized. Then and only then may we say, that we have seen the Messiah, our Epiphany, and walk in light of the rising of justice and peace!
