1 January 2027 · Syro-Malabar Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Syro-Malankara Rite · Latin Rite · മലയാളം
“She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Matthew 1:21
On the eighth day after his birth the Child was circumcised and “he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.” The Syro-Malabar Church begins the civil year with this feast of the Holy Name. In the first reading God changes Abram's name to Abraham and gives him the covenant sign; a new name means a new mission. Through Isaiah God says to his people: “I have called you by name, you are mine.” Names in the Bible are not labels; they reveal who someone is before God.
The name Jesus, Yeshua, means “the LORD saves”. The angel explains it to Joseph: “he will save his people from their sins.” And St Paul sings the hymn of Philippians: the Son emptied himself, took the form of a slave, became obedient to death on a cross, “Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend.” The way to the exalted Name passed through humility and the Cross.
Today is also the last Friday of the Nativity season, kept as the Divine Motherhood of Mary. The woman who gave the Child his human flesh is the Mother of God; she stands with the Apostles in prayer at the beginning of the Church (Acts 1:14). As the new year opens, the Church places on our lips the Name in which there is salvation, and under our eyes the Mother who keeps us close to her Son.
Theme: “You are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
The Holy Name at the start of the year: called by name, saved, exalted.
“But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.” Isaiah 43:1
“After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.” Luke 2:21
Apply: Learn the meaning of your baptismal name and thank God for it.
“Then everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved;” Joel 2:32
“She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Matthew 1:21
Apply: Pray the Jesus Prayer each morning this year.
“To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.” Isaiah 45:23
“Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,” Philippians 2:9–10
Apply: Never use the Lord's name carelessly; bow your head when you hear it.
The year begins with the Name that saves.
With Mary, Mother of God, let us carry this Name into every day.
Take-home resolution: Consecrate the new year to Jesus tonight as a family.
Dear brothers and sisters, a blessed new year to you all. On this first day of the year the Church does not begin with our plans but with a Name: the Holy Name of Jesus. Eight days after his birth, the Child was circumcised and named Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived (Luke 2:21).
In the Bible a name is never only a label. In the first reading God changes Abram's name to Abraham, father of a multitude, and gives him the covenant (Genesis 17:5). And through Isaiah he says to his people: I have called you by name, you are mine (Isaiah 43:1). Each of us was called by name at Baptism. God knows you, not as a number, but by name.
The name Jesus means the Lord saves. The angel says to Joseph: you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). We may want many things from the new year: health, a job, success for our children. Jesus comes first to save us from sin, the root of every other sorrow.
St Paul tells us how this Name was won. Christ Jesus emptied himself, took the form of a slave, humbled himself and became obedient to death on a cross. Therefore God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name (Philippians 2:7–9). The way to glory is the way of humility.
Today is also the last Friday of Nativity, when our Church honours the Divine Motherhood of Mary. She who gave Jesus his human flesh is truly the Mother of God, and she stands with the Apostles in prayer (Acts 1:14). Let us begin this year with her.
So let us make a simple resolution: to call on the Name of Jesus every day. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Let this Name be on our lips in joy and in trouble, and this year will be blessed. Amen.
On the eighth day the Child received the name Jesus, which means “the Lord saves”. We begin the year by calling on that name.
📖 Isaiah 43:1
📖 Luke 2:21
Apply: Learn the meaning of your own baptismal name.
📖 Isaiah 45:22–23
📖 Philippians 2:9–11
Apply: Bow your head whenever the name of Jesus is spoken at the Holy Qurbana.
📖 Joel 2:32
📖 Acts 4:12
Apply: Begin each day this year with the name of Jesus.
The name of Jesus is our programme for the new year: God saves.
Whatever this year holds, we face it in his name.
Take-home resolution: This year I will begin and end each day by calling on the name of Jesus.
Dear brothers and sisters, a blessed new year to all of you. On the eighth day after his birth the Child was circumcised and was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived (Luke 2:21). The name means the Lord saves. God chose it himself.
In the Bible a name is a mission. The angel told Joseph: you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). Every time we say the name of Jesus, we confess what he came to do.
Paul tells us that because Jesus humbled himself to the cross, God gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend (Philippians 2:9–10). That is why we bow our heads at his name.
Peter, standing before the council, said: there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12). We do not know what this year will bring. But we know the name in which we will face it.
So let us begin the year as the Church begins it: in the name of Jesus. Let it be the first word on our lips in the morning and the last at night. And may the Lord bless us and keep us in his name throughout this year. Amen.
In 431 the Council of Ephesus proclaimed Mary Theotokos, Mother of God. The first day of the year belongs to her and to her Son.
📖 Isaiah 7:14
📖 Galatians 4:4–5
Apply: Pray the Hail Mary slowly today, weighing the words “Mother of God”.
📖 Psalm 77:11–12
📖 Luke 2:19
Apply: Each night this year, recall one thing God did that day.
📖 Numbers 6:24–26
📖 Galatians 4:6–7
Apply: Put your family under Mary's protection for the year.
Mary, Mother of God, is also our mother.
With her we begin the year pondering God's works in our hearts.
Take-home resolution: I will entrust this year to Mary, Mother of God, and keep a habit of thanksgiving each night.
Dear friends, today the Church greets Mary with her greatest title: Mother of God. In the year 431 the bishops gathered at Ephesus defended this title, because the Child she bore is not a man who later became God, but the eternal Son of God made man. Honouring Mary protects the truth about Jesus.
Paul says: when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman (Galatians 4:4). God did not come among us from nowhere. He came through a mother, through a family, through a people.
When the shepherds told what they had seen, Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart (Luke 2:19). She did not understand everything, but she kept it and turned it over in prayer. That is a good way to live a year.
Paul adds: because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father (Galatians 4:6). Through Mary's Son we become children of God.
So let us begin the year with her. Let us ask Mary, Mother of God, to keep our families, and let us learn from her to ponder each day what God has done. And may the Lord bless us and keep us, and give us peace. Amen.
Children, today is Jesus' name day! The name Jesus means God saves us. Let us say his name with love every day.
Do you know your own name's meaning? Ask your parents tonight, and thank God for calling you by name.
Lord Jesus, your Name means “the Lord saves”. At the beginning of this new year we bow before your holy Name, which is above every name. Write your Name on our hearts, save us from our sins, and keep us all through this year under the mantle of your Mother, the Mother of God. To you be glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever. Amen.
The Church opens the civil year with a name. On the eighth day after his birth the Child is circumcised and named, and today’s readings ask what a name means before God. In Genesis, God gives Abram a new name and a sign in the flesh. In Isaiah, he tells a people in exile that he has called them by name. In Philippians, the one who emptied himself receives “the name that is above every name”. In Matthew and Luke, the angel’s word to Joseph and the rite of the eighth day come together: he is called Jesus, because he saves.
The line runs from a name given to one man to a name before which every knee bends. The key words are covenant, called by name, emptied and Jesus.
Setting.
Abram has already heard God’s promises (Genesis 12; 15), and he has already tried to secure them his own way through Hagar (Genesis 16). Now he is ninety-nine and still has no son by Sarai. Into that dead end God speaks again. Many scholars think this chapter received its final form in priestly circles around the time of the exile, when a people without land or Temple held on to circumcision and the sabbath as signs of who they were.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless.” (17:1)
The word for “blameless”, tāmîm, means whole, undivided. God does not ask Abraham for a spotless record but for a whole heart.
“No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations.” (17:5)
God speaks in the past tense, “I have made you”, of something that has not yet happened. His promise is as good as done.
“to be God to you and to your offspring after you.” (17:7)
This is the centre of the covenant. Land and descendants are gifts, but the greatest gift is God himself.
“You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.” (17:11)
The sign reaches into the household: the child eight days old, who can decide nothing, and the slave bought from a foreigner (17:12). Belonging begins with God’s gift, and it is wider than blood.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism sees in the call of Abraham God’s plan to gather scattered humanity (CCC 59). St Paul says that Abraham “received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith” (Romans 4:11). When the Son of God is circumcised, “the sign of his incorporation into Abraham’s descendants”, says the Catechism, he enters the people of the covenant and submits to the Law; and the same sign prefigures Baptism, “the circumcision of Christ” (CCC 527; Colossians 2:11–12). The Church honours the Jewish people, for whom this sign remains holy to this day, because “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Romans 11:29; CCC 839).
Setting.
Isaiah 40–55 speaks to the Jews in exile in Babylon. They have lost land, king and Temple, and they think that God has finished with them. The chapter just before ends with Israel’s blindness and the fire of punishment (42:24–25). Then comes “But now”. The words that follow are among the tenderest in the Old Testament.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.” (43:1)
The last three words are the heart of the passage. The exile has not cancelled them.
“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you” (43:2)
Waters recall the sea of the Exodus and the Jordan. God does not promise that there will be no waters and no fire. He promises to be there.
“everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory” (43:7)
The promise ends with a people who carry God’s name. Today’s feast shows how far that will go: the Name will be carried in human flesh.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism applies these words to each believer: “God calls each one by name” (CCC 2158). Everyone’s name is sacred, and in Baptism the Christian receives a name in the Church (CCC 2156, 2158). The passage through water and fire is easily heard by Christians as a word about Baptism and about trial, where the Lord does not spare us the river but goes through it with us.
Setting.
Paul writes from prison (1:13) to the Christians of Philippi, a Roman colony in Macedonia (Acts 16:12), a community he loves. They have disputes and rivalries (2:3; 4:2). To heal them he does not give a rule but points to Christ. Many scholars think that vv. 6–11 are an early Christian hymn which Paul quotes; others think he wrote them himself. Either way, this is among the oldest statements we have of faith in Christ’s divinity.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,” (2:6)
“but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.” (2:7)
In the Roman world a slave had no rights over his own life. Roman emperors accepted divine honours; this one, who was truly equal with God, goes the other way.
“he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death” (2:8)
The verse goes on to add “even death on a cross”. In Philippi, a Roman colony, everyone knew that this was the death for slaves and rebels. It is the lowest point of the descent.
“so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,” (2:10)
These words echo Isaiah 45:23, “To me every knee shall bow”, spoken there by the Lord God himself. Paul applies them to Jesus. What was said of God alone is now said of the crucified one, “to the glory of God the Father” (2:11).
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism quotes this hymn as the Church’s song of the Incarnation (CCC 461), and teaches that the Son became truly man without ceasing to be truly God (CCC 464, 469). It reads the Name as revealed in the Resurrection (CCC 434), and it says that the name of Jesus is at the heart of Christian prayer (CCC 435). St Leo the Great, in his letter to Flavian, says that this emptying was a bending down in compassion, not a failure of power (in substance). St John Chrysostom, preaching on Philippians, argues that the Son could lay aside his glory because it was his by nature and not something seized (in substance).
Setting.
Matthew has just given the genealogy, which ends with “Joseph the husband of Mary” (1:16). The problem is plain: the line runs through Joseph, and yet the child is not Joseph’s. Vv. 18–25 explain how Jesus is both conceived by the Holy Spirit as Son of God and son of David through Joseph, who names him and so receives him as his own.
Betrothal in that world was a binding bond, commonly lasting some months before the couple lived together. A betrothed man was already called husband, and the bond could be ended only by divorce. That is why Joseph plans to “dismiss her quietly”.
Luke’s single verse (2:21) adds the rite. As with John the Baptist (Luke 1:59), the child is circumcised and named on the eighth day, as the Law says (Leviticus 12:3). Matthew tells of the naming and Luke tells of the day; the feast joins them.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” (1:21)
The angel gives Joseph a father’s task, since a father gave the name. By naming the child, Joseph places him in the line of David (CCC 437). The saving announced here is salvation from sins, not first from Rome.
“Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son” (1:23)
The Hebrew of Isaiah 7:14 has ‘almâ, a young woman; the Greek translation which Matthew quotes has parthenos, a virgin. The Church reads Matthew’s words as he meant them: the Child is conceived by the Holy Spirit, without a human father (CCC 496–497).
“When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him” (1:24)
Matthew records no word from Joseph. His answer is his obedience.
“and he named him Jesus.” (1:25)
“and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.” (Luke 2:21)
The name came from God before the child came to his mother. It is a gift and a mission from the beginning.
How the Church reads it.
St Bernard of Clairvaux, preaching on the Song of Songs, calls the name of Jesus honey in the mouth, music in the ear, and joy in the heart (in substance). The Catechism says that this one name contains everything, and it speaks of the prayer of the Name handed on in Sinai, Syria and Mount Athos: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners” (CCC 2666–2668). On Mary’s virginity the Church teaches that it was real and perpetual (CCC 499–501).
Why was the Son of God circumcised?
Not because he needed purifying. By this rite he entered his people, Israel, and placed himself under the Law, “born of a woman, born under the law” (Galatians 4:4). It is a first sign of his obedience, and it prefigures Baptism (CCC 527).
Why do Christians not circumcise, if Genesis calls it an everlasting covenant?
The first Christians faced this question directly, and the apostles decided in Jerusalem that Gentile believers were not to be bound by it (Acts 15). In Christ the sign of entry is Baptism (Colossians 2:11–12). This is no contempt for the Jewish people’s fidelity: God’s covenant with them has not been revoked (CCC 121, 839).
Does “until she had borne a son” (Matthew 1:25) mean that Mary and Joseph later lived as husband and wife?
No. The Greek “until” says what happened up to a point and says nothing of what came after. Matthew’s concern here is that the child was not Joseph’s. Compare 28:20, “to the end of the age”, which does not mean that the Lord will then leave us. St Jerome argued this against Helvidius, and the Church teaches Mary’s perpetual virginity (CCC 499–501).
The Malayalam ഈശോ comes through the Syriac form of the name, Isho‘. Syriac is a dialect of Aramaic, the family of languages our Lord himself spoke, so a Syro-Malabar Christian who says ഈശോ stands close to the sound his Mother used. In the Holy Qurbana the Lakhumara hymn addresses him by that name: Lord of all, we praise you; Jesus Christ, we glorify you. Today, at the start of a new year, the whole of what we hope for can be gathered in this one Name.