At the wedding feast of Cana,

at the request of His mother, Jesus chose to work the first of His many

miracles, or signs.

This we know and have heard

many times before. But what is a sign? What is its purpose? And how shall

we know it?

There are many kinds of signs

in our world and each one is created and established by an authority to

impart information about what lies just beyond it. It does not stand as

an end unto itself, but serves rather to point us to a deeper reality.

Street signs such as stop signs,

yield signs, and exit signs harken to the deeper purpose of the safety

and well-being of all on the road. Signs of affection, such as hugs, kisses

and back rubs show forth the love and affection of one for another.

But is the sign the same thing

as that to which it points? No. If a hug could encapsulate the depth of

another's feeling for you, be careful and make sure your wallet is still

there when they let go! No sign can ever effectively transmit the fullness

of the reality it points to, unless it is one with that reality. The closer

a sign gets to the reality, the more completely it accomplishes its purpose,

the more perfected it becomes.

Take a billboard on the highway

that advertises for McDonald's. Is it McDonald's? No. Or the great blue

signs farther down the road that remind you McDonald's is off this exit?

Don't expect to get a burger and fries there.

How about the 30-foot-high

sign in the parking lot out front? It too is still simply a sign pointing

to the reality beyond it, as well as the sign on the door, and the logo

on the burger wrapper. But inside the wrapper we find the essence of what

the signs were all about; and so the sign closest to perfection is perhaps

that "M" on the wrapper.

For a sign to attain perfection,

it not only needs to be closest to that which it represents, but must

also be a good sign. Now there are good signs and bad signs. A good sign

is one that is readable, understandable and accurate, while a bad sign

is often one that is illegible, confusing, broken, overgrown and inaccurate.

And so Jesus establishes His

first sign at Cana by turning water into wine 150 gallons worth.

What is its purpose, to what does it point? The book of Proverbs directs

us to "give strong drink to him who is perishing, and wine to those

in bitter distress; let them drink and forget their poverty, and remember

their misery no more." (31:6-7)

The Messiah had come to just

such a people perishing in the darkness of sin and despair, suffering

from spiritual poverty and distress, longing for the love and mercy of

God. This wine, then, becomes more than a good deed for a newly wedded

couple; it is a sign of that abundant, rich and living love of God. When

explaining the purpose of his coming he would later say, "I came

that they might have life, and have it to the fullest," and what

sign better signifies that than the transformation of ordinary water into

rich and robust wine?

Eventually Christ would perform

many signs, all of which served to further expose and display the intense

love of God for man and His desire to see man whole. They were clear,

legible and accurate, for all mankind to see. These signs served to heal,

strengthen, unite, renew and celebrate the life of all who responded to

them and moved beyond appearance to the reality which lay beyond.

Some of these signs were so

powerful and transforming that Christ empowered and ordered his apostles

to repeat them so all might know this life. Thus the sacraments continue

today as perpetual and living signs, points of contact between this world

and the physical person of Jesus Christ.

The more the Christian understands,

embraces and unites with them, the closer they approach to the reality

to which these signs point, Jesus Christ, and the more perfectly they

reflect Him to the world. The Christian himself becomes a sign pointing

to a deeper reality.

But Satan, the prince of this

world, has his own signs, which point to the selfishness, division, rejection

and destruction of which he alone is the father. He has his own "church"

with his own "sacraments," which also serve to draw us to a

deeper reality, but one that seeks rather to perpetuate and celebrate

death rather than life.

In embracing these, the individual

is deformed rather than transformed, being dragged away from the fundamental

reality in which we were created. These are

the signs of our times: the hatred, violence, murder, abuse and ignorance

that continue to plague our world.

Apart from Christ there is

no life, but in Christ is found the fullness of life itself. To which

do the signs of our lives point, and how? In a time of such great confusion

and darkness in matters of love and life, what is needed is a clear, legible

and accurate sign of the abundant, rich and living love of God; one that

approaches the perfection of the reality to which it points. What is needed

is a renewed commitment among Christians to embrace the value and dignity

of each and every human life, and not just step over or around them in

pursuit of our goals.

What is needed is a profound

hunger to be one with Jesus Christ.

[Father Kevin Peek is the parochial

vicar at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Peachtree City.]