1. God says, “here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased.” Then a voice came from heaven, saying to Jesus, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased. What are the implications?

2. Wastelands, deserts, rugged land and rough country (Isaiah 40). Could these words describe our world today? Covid? Election politics? Racism? Climate crisis? Does this reading suggest that there is help in fixing these or do you have to do it all yourself?

Second Reading
Acts 10:34-38
Titus 2:11-14; 3:4-7

1. In the reading from Acts, Peter is quoted as saying this about Jesus: “He went about doing good and healing all those oppressed by the devil.”Compare this with Isaiah in the First Reading: “I formed you…to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out prisoners from confinement, and from the dungeon, those who live in darkness.”

2 Did we do anything to earn salvation? Why does God give it to us? What does St. Paul in his letter to Titus say about the extravagance of God’s gift to us?

Gospel
Luke 3:15-16, 21-22

1. John the Baptist was the middleman. He pointed back to Isaiah and forward to Jesus, connecting the whole plan. What or who are the “middlemen or women” who connect you with God? Can you serve as a middle-one?

2. Because we were baptized and are children of God, Pope Francis says we can call God Daddy. What does he say is our vocation as children of God?

Baptism, therefore, is not merely an external rite. Those who receive it are transformed deep within, in their inmost being, and possess new life, which is precisely what allows them to turn to God and call on him with the name of “Abba,” that is, “daddy.” “Father”? No: “daddy.” (cf. Gal 4:6)
…

Every distinction becomes secondary to the dignity of being children of God, who, through his love, creates a real and substantial equality. Everyone, through Christ’s redemption and the baptism we have received, we are all equal: children of God. Equal. …

And one of the apostles, in the Letter of James, says this: “Be aware about differences, because it is not right that when someone enters the assembly (that is, the Mass) wearing a gold ring and well-dressed, ‘Ah, come up here, up here!’ and you give him one of the front seats. Then, if someone else enters, … you see he is poor, poor, poor, “Oh, yeah, you can go over there in the back.” … No, we are equal! Rather, our vocation is that of making concrete and evident the call to unity of the entire human race (cf Conc. Ecum. Vat. II, Cost. Lumen gentium, 1).

Pope Francis: Which of you knows the exact date of your baptism?
Sept. 8, 2021

Anne Osdieck