Solemnity of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist
JOY OF BIRTH
In his childhood, the charismatic and tragically deceased UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld put a rhymed text into his mother's prayer book, which he himself translated from some foreign language. It went something like this: “The day you came into the world, everyone was happy, only you cried. Live in such a way that on the day you leave this world, everyone else will cry, and you will have a smile on your face and meet death calmly, whenever it comes”.
This text can be successfully applied to John the Baptist, especially on the day on which we solemnly remember his birth. He was a great and powerful man. It is no accident that even Sunday leaves a place for it in the liturgical calendar of the Church. A place in proportion to the role he played in the history of salvation, standing on the bridge connecting the Old and New Covenants. It is hard to imagine, but in his homeland for a long time, while living at the same time as Christ, John the Baptist was a more famous figure, and it was not easy for him to convince his disciples that "he was not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals" who will come for him. Even his adversaries, such as King Herod, respected John. To earn the respect of enemies, someone must be a man of extraordinary greatness.
The death of St. John viewed from the human side was irrational. A great prophet who is beheaded onlybecause a weak king succumbs to the whim of his illegitimate wife. In this respect, John the Baptist was only one of the victims of human stupidity, and if he were only an average person, his death would not be mentioned. But John was not an average man. Therefore, his martyrdom does not end his biography, but gives it a new, fuller, history-saving dimension. It rises to the rank of a testimony. And since death is only the last note of a symphony that a person writes throughout his life, one must go back to the beginning, to the first note, to the day of birth, and maybe even further, to the mysterious plan of God, who wanted someone who was just like John the Baptist. This is what the liturgy of the Church does.
God's unique intentions for John the Baptist seem to suggest the special nature of his birth. Although the birth of every human being is associated with the creative interference of God, who at the moment of conception gives man an immortal soul, it will not be a mistake to say that, as a rule, it is the parents planning a child that "determine" the moment when God irrevocably begins to act. With the birth of John the Baptist, however, it was a bit different. Here the parents could do little, and to be honest - from a human point of view, also because of their old age - they could do nothing. The parents clearly interpreted the birth of this child as a miracle. Zechariah knew this from the very beginning, but Elizabeth, too, had no doubt that it was "the Lord had shown such great mercy over her." There is no doubt, therefore, that in the birth of St. John the Baptist, God himself played a much greater role than his natural parents. The words of the prophet Isaiah come to mind here: "the LORD called me; from my mother’s womb he gave me my name. He made my mouth like a sharp-edged sword, concealed me, shielded by his hand [...] And he said to me: “It is too little, he says, for you to be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and restore the survivors of Israel; I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth. " Who was St. John? Christ himself answered this: “What did you go out to see in the wilderness? (...) to see the Prophet? Yes, I tell you, even more than a prophet. He is the one about whom it is written: Behold, I am sending my messenger ahead of you to prepare the way for you. Truly I say to you, among those who were born of women there was no greater than John the Baptist (Mt 11: 7-11; Lk 7: 24-27).
However, the fact that the birth of great men is accompanied in the Bible by extraordinary circumstances does not imply that whoever is born "normally" cannot become a great man. In the light of the same Gospel which speaks of the birth of John the Baptist, the mystery of the birth of every human being takes on a new, supernatural splendor. After all, for a believer, each child is a sign of God's great mercy, and leaning over each newborn, we ask ourselves the question, "Who will this child be?" And even if you do not know immediately who he will be, you know that he will be someone unique, someone whom God wants for himself and for whom he also has special plans. There are no "average" people in God's eternal plan. God creates and loves by name. And all are called to greatness, just as all are called to salvation and holiness.
Our calling is to point to Jesus
God entrusted such a man with the mission of pointing to Jesus as the Expected. He did so at Jordan when he recognized the Holy One among the multitude of sinners. First, he refused, then he fulfilled his duty: he washed Jesus with the water of penance. God prepared him for this moment. And John was faithful at that moment, as he had always been faithful to what is good. He paid for this fidelity with his life. As a Voice, he was faithful to the Word to the end. As a man he deserved the unique praise from Jesus' mouth: "Among those born of women there is no greater than John" (cf. Lk 7:28). Great calling, great fidelity, great goodness the Prophet of Jordan. He disappeared in the splendor of Jesus - but this is why He was called so that Jesus would increase and he would decrease (cf. John 3:30).