Epiphany, which celebrates when the wise men arrived to worship the newborn Christ Child, is a beautiful day on the Church’s calendar, and it deserves to be celebrated!
My family has a tradition of throwing an Epiphany party on the first Sunday of January. Here are five reasons to consider hosting your own Epiphany party.
1. It helps you and your guests to enter more deeply into the liturgical calendar and the life of Christ
Holy Mother Church gives us times of feasting and fasting for a reason: We need them! Having a Christmas party days after most people have put away their trees and lights helps reinforce that the King has come into the world and changed everything.
2. People are more likely to be free than before Christmas
People are always busy, but they’re perhaps never busier than leading up to Christmas. Buying presents, attending parties, making cookies, traveling — it’s a lot to keep track of. If you try having a party before Christmas, you will have a tough time getting people to come. However, by the time Epiphany rolls around, people have a lot more time.
3. There are lots of great Epiphany traditions
Like any ancient Christian feast, Epiphany has many traditions associated with it. Some are widely known, such as blessing one’s home or singing “We Three Kings,” while some are more obscure. A fun one is to bake a cake or cookies with three beans inside of them, and whoever gets a bean gets to be one of the wise men for a day, wearing a paper crown around the party and bringing it home! And of course there’s the King cake in which a plastic figurine of the baby Jesus is placed inside. Whoever gets the slice with the baby in it is “king” for the day and is responsible for baking the cake the following year.
4. It’s a great way to invite Protestant loved ones into distinctly Catholic traditions
In recent years, many Protestants have started to recognize the importance of practices like liturgical calendars, fasting, and even Lent. They can be intimidated or even scandalized by celebrations of the saints, but Epiphany is an easy celebration for our Protestant friends and family members to understand. Inviting them into your celebration can help heal divides and invite them closer to the Church Christ founded.
5. It builds Christian community
God did not make man to be isolated. Every human person is called to communion with others. Today, we live in a time of widespread social isolation. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that around one in three Americans consistently feels lonely , and according to AP News, one in five Americans have no close friends. Making time to welcome others into our homes can help fight loneliness and remind people of Christ’s message of hope and love.