Sorry for the delay… BUT>>>> WE have a winner! BEFORE I announce the winner! I have a few special mentions. @Adam Habershaw Came in with 16 points even with a busy seminary schedule! Keep it up! @Elsa came in with 24 points! @Andrew Lanchoney Came in with 2 points. @Elizabeth Wright came to 37 points! But… @Kristen Hazard came in with a whopping, …… 44 points! Great work! Let’s get ready for our next challenge! Congrats all! Happy New Year!

A family member of mine is a police officer and has to attend a protest in Providence this afternoon at 2pm. Please pray for his safety and for peace to come to my heart that is filled with worry.

Today’s Gospel reminds us to let Jesus take the Lead. I’m not sure that we can, from this bird’s-eye view two thousand years later, fully appreciate the scene unfolding between Jesus and John the Baptist in the Jordan River. John is a man who always follows God’s prompting. In the desert he announces the coming of Christ. He tells his own disciples that he is not worthy even to untie Jesus’ sandals. And now he is asked to do the unthinkable—to baptize Jesus Himself. Then the heavens open, and the voice of the Father speaks: “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.” Jesus deliberately takes the lower place. He steps into line with sinners. He identifies Himself with those who need repentance, in order to meet them exactly where they are. And only then does heaven reveal His glory and command the crowd to follow Him. This reveals a profound truth about the life of Jesus. We first saw Him in a manger, identifying with the lowly, and yet summoning kings, shepherds, and angels to worship His glory. Now He walks among sinners as one of them, not to remain there, but to show them the way to glory. Here is the lesson: the art of the Christian life — for each baptized Christian — is learning to let God take the lead. We become real disciples only when we learn how to follow the Lord. But if God is in the lead, then I am not—and that is where our resistance begins. We worry that if God’s plans are not our plans, then we will lose our freedom. What will become of us? What will life look like? We want a say in what happens to us and for us. So instead of listening, we try to take charge. We say, Bless my plans. Support my timing. Endorse my priorities. And yet St. Thomas Aquinas reminds us that grace does not destroy our freedom—it perfects it. God’s leadership does not diminish us; it heals us. If we are honest, we have been in charge for quite some time—and we are still broken, still discouraged, still struggling with sin and vice. We act as though handing our life over to God is like giving a teenager with a learner’s permit the keys to an expensive sports car. We hesitate. And yet every time we insist on control, every time we try to lead, we go astray anyway. We wander. We crash.