Do you ever look outside the window and think to yourself, ‘What would it be like if Christ were out there now, walking around as one of us?’
Well, He was. Probably not in the locality of where you reading this are living. But He became man nonetheless and lived upon the Earth as one of us.
It’s easy to forget sometimes when so much of our focus towards Him stems from our own imaginations and from artwork and sculptures, that Our Lord was as visible as a person that you might see when you peer out of your window out on to the street.
We are reminded of this with the Wedding at Cana, when Our Lord is in a very human situation. We see it too with His tears for Lazarus. And we see it also in the lesser acknowledged event of His circumcision.
Circumcision was an important event for all Jewish males. Christ received the name of Jesus on this occasion, just as we present our names and become part of the Church at our baptism.
By becoming man, and first becoming a baby boy subject to the rules and laws of the Jewish religion, Christ fundamentally changed the world in which we live. His circumcision was the first time that he had shed blood for humanity. It was a foreshadowing of the blood that He would later shed at Calvary.
Lessons
The lessons to take from Our Lord’s circumcision, aside from His love in shedding blood for us, were that he was indeed human and he modelled an obedience for us that we would do well to follow.
Regarding His humanity, the joy of the unborn child John the Baptist leaping in the womb in proximity to the unborn Lord preceded a life wherein He spent 30 years living and experiencing what it was the be with family and friends. He experienced the world through two eyes and two ears as any of the rest of us would. Remembering His humanity, real as you or I, is a good starting point for remembering that He never left our presence and lives on in His Church and in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Christ promised to be with us always and from the Immaculate Conception and from the blood shed in the circumcision up to and including every Mass, He is. How we look at the world and act within it should reflect that.
This is related to the other aspect of its importance, that of obedience. We obey God insofar as we can and we obey His Church and its traditions with the humility that He Himself modelled for us.
Devotion
From the time of Christ until the Late Middle Ages, there were several places within Christendom which claimed to have the true relic of the Holy Prepuce, that is the foreskin and umbilical cord of Jesus as passed from the Virgin Mary to Mary Magdalene.
Many different Churches claimed to be in possession of the real relic until as recent as the 19th century. The most recent claimant in the village of Calcata in Italy celebrated the 1st of January with the relic every year until 1983, when it was reported that a priest had stolen the relic.
Although devotion to the physical relic has obviously disappeared with the passage of time, there is no reason why our own devotions should not be based upon what Our Lord’s circumcision is representative of. That is, His love for us and His real presence amongst us.
Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.