Liturgical Study - 2nd Sunday of OT - Novus Ordo - Year A
January 18, 2026
• First Reading: Isaiah 49:3, 5–6
• Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 40
• Second Reading: First Corinthians 1:1–3
• Gospel: John 1:29–34 — “Behold the Lamb of God”
“Behold the Lamb of God”
With the Christmas cycle complete and Epiphany concluded, the Church does not rush forward. She pauses — and points.
Before Christ acts publicly, before miracles multiply, before power is displayed, the Church insists on something more fundamental:
Christ must be rightly identified.
This Sunday is about recognition before response, identity before mission, worship before action. Ordinary Time does not begin with instruction — it begins with adoration.
1. FIRST READING — Isaiah 49:3, 5–6 — The Servant Revealed as Light
Isaiah presents the Servant of the Lord — chosen from the womb, formed by God, and commissioned not merely for Israel, but for the nations.
This Servant does not conquer by force. He restores by obedience. He is light, not spectacle.
The Church places this reading here to establish a critical truth:
Christ’s mission is universal, but His method is sacrificial. He saves not by domination, but by self-gift.
2. RESPONSORIAL PSALM — Psalm 40 — Obedience Over Sacrifice
Psalm 40 interprets Isaiah’s Servant interiorly:
“Sacrifice or offering you wished not…
but ears open to obedience you gave me.”
This psalm announces a revolution in worship. God desires not ritual alone, but the obedient heart.
The Church deliberately places this psalm before the Gospel so that when Christ is named Lamb, we understand what kind of Lamb He is:
not merely offered — but obedient unto death.
3. SECOND READING — 1 Corinthians 1:1–3 — A People Called Into Communion
St. Paul addresses a divided Corinthian Church and begins not with correction, but with identity.
They are “called to be holy.”
They belong to Christ.
Grace and peace flow from God, not effort.
This reading prepares the listener to understand that recognizing Christ as Lamb necessarily creates a distinct people. To behold the Lamb is to be claimed by Him.
4. GOSPEL — John 1:29–34 — The Lamb Identified
Now the Church reaches the summit of the Sunday.
John the Baptist does not perform a miracle. He does not preach repentance here. He does something more decisive:
“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”
This is sacrificial language. Temple language. Passover language.
John identifies Jesus not merely as Messiah, but as Victim.
Christ is revealed as the One upon whom the Spirit rests — not temporarily, but permanently. The Baptist’s testimony ends here. Recognition is complete.
Before Christ does anything publicly, the Church teaches us who He is.
5. The Theological Unity Now Fully Revealed
The Church’s placement of these readings is not aesthetic but doctrinally exacting. This Sunday is deliberately constructed to prevent a common modern error: separating Christ’s identity from Christ’s mission, or worse, separating Christological worship from moral discipleship.
The progression is deliberate:
• Isaiah 49 reveals the Servant chosen before action, rooted in divine initiative rather than human achievement. The Servant’s mission is universal (“a light to the nations”), yet His method is humility and obedience, not domination. This guards against triumphalist misreadings of Christ’s kingship.
• Psalm 40 interprets that mission interiorly. God desires obedience before sacrifice — not because sacrifice is abolished, but because sacrifice without obedience is meaningless. This psalm prefigures Christ’s own interior disposition toward the Cross.
• 1 Corinthians 1 establishes that beholding Christ creates a people set apart. Identity precedes instruction. The Church is not formed by shared projects but by shared belonging to Christ.
• John 1 culminates the sequence by publicly identifying Jesus as the Lamb — not metaphorically, but sacrificially. The title is forensic, cultic, and eschatological. Christ is named as the definitive offering who removes sin, not merely mitigates it.
Taken together, the readings insist on a single, unified truth:
Christian life begins not with ethical imitation, but with correct worship.
This is why the Church begins Ordinary Time not with moral exhortation, but with adoration rightly ordered toward Christ’s true identity. Any attempt to reverse this order — to “do” Christianity before “beholding” Christ — results in moralism rather than sanctity.
6. Interconnectedness, Magisterial Illumination, and Catholic Interpretation
The Church’s magisterial tradition is explicit: salvation flows from Christ’s obedient self-offering, not merely from His teaching or example.
The Catechism teaches:
“Jesus freely offered Himself for our salvation… His obedience unto death transformed the curse of death into a blessing.” (CCC §§609, 615)
St. Thomas Aquinas clarifies that Christ’s Passion saves not by physical suffering alone, but because it is an act of perfect obedience, freely embraced (ST III, q.47, a.2). This is why Psalm 40 is indispensable here: it reveals the interior sacrifice that makes the exterior sacrifice salvific.
Likewise, St. Augustine of Hippo warns that admiration of Christ without submission to His sacrificial identity reduces Him to a moral teacher rather than the Redeemer (cf. Tractates on John 4.10)4.
The Church therefore places “Behold the Lamb of God” at the threshold of Ordinary Time to establish a permanent rule of Christian existence:
Orthodoxy precedes orthopraxy.
Worship precedes mission.
Identity precedes ethics.
To behold Christ incorrectly — as inspirational figure, social reformer, or exemplar — is to build Christian life on sand. Only by beholding Him as the sacrificial Lamb can obedience, charity, and discipleship follow rightly ordered.
7. Practical Application — Begin with Beholding
This Sunday demands a reordering of priorities:
• Worship before work
• Adoration before action
• Identity before mission
The question placed before the faithful is simple and piercing:
Do I behold Christ as the Lamb — or merely use Him as an example?