We all like to be told, “Good job.” It’s even better to be told, “You’re a really great person.” Deep in our hearts, we all long to hear the words that Jesus heard as he broke through the waters of the Jordan at his baptism: “You are my beloved child of whom I am well pleased.”

January is a big month for health club memberships. As the new year begins, a lot of the people in the pews may be struggling with “resolutions” they made at the beginning of the year. It’s tempting to believe that unless I can change my looks, my weight, my behavior, I am worth nothing.

January’s probably not the month most of us like to go swimming. I’ve heard of groups that take a swim in the ocean every January 1, but that sort of chilling experience is not how I personally want to dive into 2009.

A nervous mother telephoned the priest just a week before the scheduled baptism of her baby. She had heard that when he baptized babies, he immersed them in the water of the font.

Praise—much more than money—is probably the single most effective human motivator. Sycophantic flattery won’t do. It must be genuine commendation for a job well done or a decision well made.

I got in a lot of trouble in grammar school. And though I didn’t like staying after school, the punishment I really hated was hearing that my behavior “reflected badly on my parents.” 

On our Lord Jesus Christ God’s favor rests. In faith and praise we offer our intercessions and respond, Glory to God!

The first mention of the Jordan River in Hebrew scripture is when Abraham and Lot parted company: “And Lot lifted up his eyes, and saw that the Jordan valley was well-watered everywhere like the garden of the Lord” (Gen. 13:10-11). Jacob was renamed Israel at the ford of the Jabbok River, a tributary of the Jordan (Gen. 32:22-28).

Jesus rises from the waters; the world rises with him. —Saint Gregory of Nazianzen (329?-390)