“There was a wedding at Cana in Galilee.” We’re in Ordinary Time now, Green Time, but the light of the Epiphany is still shining on us. Traditionally, Epiphany comprises three events: the visit of the Magi, Christ’s Baptism in the Jordan and the changing of the water into wine at the wedding in Cana. The visit of the wise men looked forward to the faith of the Gentiles. The Baptism in the Jordan looked forward to his Death and Resurrection and to our baptisms. The miracle at Cana looks forward to the Last Supper, to Good Friday, and to the marriage of Christ to his wife, the Church, sealed in the wine-turned-blood of every Eucharist. All these things tie together. And how well, these first Sundays, the Church sets us up for the year ahead!
Let me say three things.
First, “Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.” By accepting that invitation, the Lord gave his blessing to the marriage of man and woman. In the miracle that followed he turned water into wine, and in the Sacrament of Matrimony he turns the good water of human love into the wine of his own love affair with the Church. Today, every sacramentally married couple is assured that their relationship and their family enjoy the companionship of Christ. Every day in fact Christ renews the grace of their marriage. And every day, in prayer, the couple can reissue their invitation to the Lord to be part of their journey. every day.
Secondly, at the beginning of the year, we’re shown this “icon” of Christ the Bridegroom, Christ the Husband. In the first, Old Testament, reading, the Israelites in exile were given the promise that their city, their nation, would no longer be termed Forsaken or Desolate, but Married and my Delight – “Darling” you might say. “And as [in an ordinary wedding] the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.” The Old Testament prophets were already on to this and in the New it comes into focus even more. Now God’s husbandly, bonding, self-giving love is embodied in Christ. He married our human nature when he took flesh in Mary’s womb. He married the Church when he poured out his blood and his Spirit on the Cross, and he weds each one of us through faith and the sacraments. “We are all of us invited to a spiritual wedding, where the Bridegroom is none other than Christ the Lord…and we are the Bride…all together we are one Bride, and the soul of each single one of us is a Bride as well” (Homily of St Bernard).
What might this mean? Thinking of ourselves corporately, as a Christian people, that he’ll never leave the Church in the lurch. Individually, one by one, that, however our human relationships play out, there is always Someone true in our lives, and that “Forsaken” or “Desolate” are not our name. And that there is an unparalleled intimacy open to everyone of us. This, by the way, is one of the discoveries that come with age: how close the Lord has been to us, how delicate, how exquisitely detailed, all-embracing his providence is, down to the last hair of our heads. “Though I should walk in the valley of the shadow of death, no evil would I fear, for you are with me…Surely goodness and kindness shall follow me all the days of my life” (Ps 23: 4,6). “I can say now, from a full heart and at the end of a long life,” said St John Henry Newman, “that He has never abandoned me, never forsaken me, has always turned evil into good for me”.
And the last thought: at this wedding, Jesus produced some 120 to 180 gallons of it, and the best of the best. He does quantity and quality. When he healed, he healed perfectly. When he calmed the storm, the calm was a “great calm”. When he fed 5,000, there were 12 baskets over. “He has done everything well”, people exclaimed on one occasion. He does well with the wine, and well with us. He can turn the thin, cold, selfish water of our lives into the warm, red wine of faith, hope and love. And he told the servants to draw the water and take it to the master of the feast. As St Paul says, the one Holy Spirit poured out on us gives each of us, individually, a gift by which to serve. He gives each of us wine to serve and wine to receive. Isn’t this our humble task this Jubilee Year: in life’s daily give and take, to offer to and receive from each other, a sip, a taste, a draught of hope – the wine our Bridegroom brings?
St Mary’s Cathedral, Aberdeen, 19th January 2025
