The Nativity of St. John the Baptist

June 24 is the Solemnity of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. His is the only birth of a Saint that is celebrated in the Roman Catholic Church, and his coming was announced by an angel to his father Zechariah. “You will have joy and gladness and many will rejoice at his birth” (Luke 1:14).

John was filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb (Catechism of the Catholic Church). In Luke 1:44, Elizabeth said to her cousin, the Virgin Mary “As soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy.” John, born 6 months before Jesus, was an heroic servant of God. He was “a prophet of the most high and went before the Lord to prepare the way, to give knowledge of salvation to His people, by the forgiveness of their sins” (Luke 1:76,77).  He proclaimed baptism of repentance from selfish and sinful ways, and that one greater than he was coming who would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire (Luke 3:16).

John was eventually imprisoned and killed for speaking the truth. After calling out King Herod Antipas for his unlawful marriage to his brother’s wife, Herodias, she nefariously caused John’s beheading.