A Tsunami of Love: Rediscover the Gift of Baptism
- Archbishop James Golka
- 5 minutes ago
- 3 min read
In Baptism, every Catholic receives a new identity in Christ and a mission to share his love with the world.
The day after I was installed as Archbishop of Denver, one of my younger nieces came running up to me. She gave me a massive hug, looked up at me and said, “It’s like a tsunami of love just ran through us.”
I experienced that during the days around my installation as your archbishop, and for that, I’m grateful to each of you.
I felt it, too, during our recent pallium pilgrimage to Rome. As I knelt before Pope Leo XIV and he placed the pallium, a two-inch-wide white woolen band, on my shoulders, I felt the loving tsunami of your prayers with me.
What an image from my niece: an overwhelming, overpowering and uncontrollable flood of love sweeping us up, washing over us, moving us, changing us. I realize that a tsunami can be destructive. In this column, I refer to the magnitude, size and strength of the waves, which are not unlike how the Holy Spirit works in Baptism. The power of the Holy Spirit is for our renewal and rebirth.
In Baptism, a tsunami of divine love washes over us. We are caught up, surrounded, steeped in the love of God for us. In a certain way, we are changed to the point of death — death to our old selves, to the world and to the way we might want things to be. But, in Christ, that death blossoms into new life. St. Paul tells us that, by dying with Jesus in Baptism, we rise with him anew (Romans 6:8-10). It is no longer we who live, but Jesus who lives in us (Galatians 2:20). Our new life is made entirely new; we are made entirely new, alive in Christ and sent forth in his love (2 Corinthians 5:17).
We are claimed by Jesus, redeemed and brought home to the Father in the Holy Spirit. That’s our primary relationship: communion with the Trinity. We become beloved children of the Father, overwhelmed by God’s love for us. That’s our identity. We’re empowered by the Holy Spirit dwelling within us to return that love to God and, through him, to our neighbor as members of God’s family, the Church. That’s our mission.
This is what Baptism does. It redeems us. It raises us to new life. It makes us children of God and members of his family, the Church. It gives us an identity and a mission. And it is all pure gift, because God claims us in Jesus Christ before we could ever claim him.
This is the greatest gift that parents can give their children: the gift of new life in Christ through Baptism. It’s the greatest invitation we can extend to our non-Catholic friends, neighbors, coworkers and family, too: to enter into a loving relationship with the God who is love and has loved them first (1 John 4:8, 19).
Whether you were baptized as an infant many years ago or just last Easter, you have been redeemed by Jesus, made new, brought into relationship with the Trinity as a beloved child of God and sent on mission. A tsunami of love has washed over you, too.
But what will you do with that? Will your Baptism remain a gift forgotten in the back of your closet? Or will you receive it anew, live from it and put it to good use?
Imagine if each of us lived our baptismal relationship, identity and mission to the fullest each day. If we recognized our identity as God’s children, abiding in relationship with him. If we followed Jesus more closely in faith, hope and love for God and neighbor. If we listened more intently to the Holy Spirit rather than the other voices out there. How different would our lives, families, communities, parishes, archdiocese, state and world be?
If you’ve been baptized, you have a mission. You matter to God’s plan.
As I said at my installation, I’m all in on this mission. I’m ready to live from this gift I’ve received. How about you?
