Today as we start the first week of Ordinary Time in the Church’s year, we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord. Fr Paul Gooley reads from the Gospel of Mark (1: 7-11) in which, John the Baptist tells his followers ‘The one who comes after me is more powerful than me… I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.’ Fr Paul says there’s a couple of things you might be thinking at this point… why does this Gospel sound so familiar? The answer is that it is exactly the same Gospel as we had on Saturday – almost word for word. In preparing this Gospel reflection, Fr Paul says he tried to find out why the readings were the same without success but will continue his quest for an answer. However, today we celebrate the Baptism of Jesus and, like we did last Saturday, we might reflect for a moment on what the experience of Baptism is for Jesus and for us. Again we might reflect that when Jesus was baptised, the heavens were torn apart, that Voice spoke from heaven, and the Spirit came down in the form of a dove. For Jesus the experience of Baptism must been one of feeling very treasured, being embraced by the Person whom he calls his ‘Father’. The Baptism also marks a new beginning. It starts to build the foundation of faith for us. Baptism is the first of three sacraments of initiation and once a person receives all three of those sacraments its then said they are a full member of the church. With this in mind, Fr Paul invites us to ask Our Lord, remembering his Baptism, remembering how close he is to that person he loves ‘God the Father’, for his blessing on this day.