The inspiration for today's homily comes from a man named Paul Weihofen, an individual about whom you probably have never heard. Paul is the bass guitarist for the 4:00 Contemporary Choir at St. Paul's Church here in Joliet, someone whom I have known for over a decade. In addition to his guitar playing, Paul serves as the electronics guru over at the parish and is employed by the city as one of our municipal electricians. Whenever you see one of those guys sitting in one of those buckets, fiddling with the power lines throughout the city, you pretty much can figure out what Paul does for a living.

Some ten years ago, Paul had this bright idea to do something that is quite visible in the city of Joliet, most specifically down Raynor Avenue, right next to St. Raymond's Cathedral. Paul had this idea to string up Christmas lights on all the trees of the street as his contribution to the Advent and Christmas Season. The lights added to the festive spirit of the season, something I immediately noticed while taking me evening strolls through the city.

And then something happened with the lights that made me think. After the Christmas Season came and went, the families down Raynor Avenue naturally began taking their Christmas decorations down from their houses. The lights that Paul had strung, though, remained lit through January… and February… into the spring… then summer and fall. For the last ten years or so, those Christmas lights have been shining down Raynor Avenue for the community to enjoy.

I never asked Paul why he left those Christmas lights shining on this particular street. Maybe he left them up because the city thought that the lights provided nice decoration year-round. Maybe Paul got lazy. Maybe the city of Joliet had money to burn and wanted to spend it on those Christmas lights (please don't call the city - the lights have grown on me!).

For me, the lights are a reminder of the Christmas message that must remain in our hearts throughout the entire year, a theme that often gets lost in this particular celebration each December 25th. In my way of thinking, I notice more and more how this impatient society "jumps the gun" on Christmas to such a degree that we begin celebrating the season with commercial advertisements in September and begin to play Christmas music at the beginning of November. Instead of preparing for the season spiritually, we have so much become enthralled in the commercial aspects of this experience that the reason for the season (so to speak) has been very much lost. Then, as the Christ-light truly becomes present and serves as a reason to celebrate on December 25, our society decides to take down decorations as soon as the presents are opened and the spiritual moment might very well seem lost.

It is at those times that I reflect on those lights on Raynor Avenue. I think about what those lights represent in the world of faith. For me, I think that those lights become a symbol to me of hope during my moments of darkness in life, lights that remind me that Christ is still very much present in the darkness. It reminds me of an Incarnate Son who penetrated this darkness of sin to bring us hope, to give us a chance for salvation during our darkest of times.

I lieu of today's celebration of our Lord's Baptism, I began reflecting about the one Christmas light, this one epiphany, that was given to us at the time of our own baptisms in the form of a candle that the minister presented to us as a sign of Christ's presence. During the Rite of Baptism, the presiding minister utters the following admonition to the parents of their newly baptized children:

… this light is entrusted to you to be kept burning brightly. These children of yours have been enlightened by Christ. They are to walk always as a child of the light. May they keep the flame of faith alive in their hearts. When the Lord comes, may they go out to meet Him with all the saints in the heavenly kingdom.

In this rite, the baptized child is entrusted with an eternal light that will remain visible to this gift of God throughout their existence, from the moment of their baptism, past the moment of death, and for the rest of their existence. As long as this baptized creature embraces this light, the presence of Christ will be as efficacious as those ones adorning the trees on Raynor Avenue. And even when the lights of the Christmas Season are taken down, even if someone has the bright idea of removing the decorations on Raynor Avenue, the light in our heart continues to bright. The Christmas Season of light will never depart from the person who has faith in God.

This weekend, I had the opportunity to speak about this presence of God with our eighth grade confirmation students who gathered together on a Saturday afternoon on retreat. I have been doing confirmation retreats now for about twenty years and I always find myself amazed at the change of attitude most kids go through when these retreats take place. When you are fourteen years old and society has conditioned you that being on the church property isn't a cool thing to do on a Saturday afternoon (unless you are participating in some type of sports' activity or such), these kids do not readily admit that they want to be at a foreign thing to them like a spiritual retreat.

As I have done these retreats for the last two decades, I am still amazed over the transformation of these kids in a six hour period. I have learned that when any of us allows our shell to be broken and open ourselves up to the life of faith, there is a transformation, even if just for a moment, when a great moment of grace takes place. Every time I have seen a teenager sharing their faith story with another, supporting the other teens in the group with notes of encouragement, or receiving notes of support from their parents and sponsors, I notice how the teens feel a spark of love that might not always be evident to them. This igniting of the spirit, this brief blaze of light that rekindles that fire of baptism, reintroduces a God to these kids who has always been present but sometimes not recognized and makes me realize that the hope for our future has great potential.

As we come to the end of our Christmas Season, the challenge for all of us is to keep this light of baptism burning in our hearts. We reintroduce this theme to ourselves on Easter Sunday each year, reminding ourselves how this Incarnation of the Lord is very much connected to our Lord's death and resurrection. Today is a day to remind ourselves that the lights shining down Raynor Avenue are a symbol of the kind of faith that all of us are called to embrace and share within the world. May we always be enlightened by Christ. May we walk always as children of the light. May we keep the flame of baptismal faith alive in their hearts. And when the Lord comes, may we go out to meet Him with all the saints in the heavenly kingdom.

This is our prayer.