THE GLORIOUS FEAST OF THE EPIPHANY
"This is My beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased"
(Matthew 3: 16-17).
The feast of Epiphany or
the Baptism is on Tobah 11,
which is January 19. It is the
feast of Baptism of
Christ. The Feast
of the Epiphany is
one of the Seven
Major Feasts of our
Lord. the tradition
is to celebrate the
Feast of the Nativity
up until the Feast
of the Epiphany.
On this day, we
celebrate what the
Lord Christ does for
humanity. The Holy
Trinity
appeared
to Mankind in an
obvious way. This
feast is also called the feast
of the divine manifestation.
In the Epiphany, the Lord
offered us what is His own.
By baptism we became
children of God in Christ
while we are human being.
During the liturgy, abounas
bless water and bless
the people by the water
on their foreheads and
hands to commemorate
baptism. Baptism is the first
sacrament of the Church,
and is the door through
which we enter to the other
sacraments. The earth could
not be healed of such a
great and invisible plaque by
any medications of her own,
but by the heavenly Divine
nature of the gift of the Holy
Spirit.
About Epiphany The holy
fathers told us that the
Lord Jesus has borne our
sins upon the Cross, and
erased them with His blood
as He has borne the sins of
the world, and descended
42
with them to the baptism.
Although the Lord Christ
without sin, He completed
the sacrament of the
baptism of repentance. He
baptized to bear the sins
of all of us. He
waited till He
reached the age
of thirty.
We
see
the
manifestation of
the Holy Trinity
at the baptism of
the Lord Christ:
God the Father
speaks
from
heaven, God the
Son (Jesus) is
being baptized
by John, and
God the Spirit
(the Holy Spirit)
appears in the
form of a dove. The Feast of
the Epiphany not only marks
the day of the Lord Jesus
Christ's baptism, it marks
the beginning of salvation for
us all. May the Lord Almighty
grant us all a blessed and
Holy Feast of the Epiphany.