The Lord called me from birth and made of me a light to the nations. The Church today commemorates the nativity of St. John the Baptist, a cousin and a forerunner in ministry of our Lord. John the Baptist and our Lord were basically age-mates, John being slightly older than Jesus by six months. While the Gospel accounts do not tell us whether the two cousins ever met before Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan, it appears that they somehow knew each another. John was aware of who Jesus was when Jesus approached and requested to be baptized by him. John also understood his ministry as preparatory to that of Jesus (“ What do you suppose that I am? I am not he. He is coming after me” [Acts 13:25]). On his part, Jesus also understood and appreciated the role that John played in preparing the people for his (Jesus’) arrival and heaped praise on him (cf. Matthew 11:11-14). Whereas it is somehow impossible to know in a precise manner where the personal relationship between John and Jesus ended and where the professional one picked up, it is safe to say that today’s feast is a celebration of the “professional” side of their relationship. 
The feast of the birth of John the Baptist celebrates more than the very event of his being born to Elizabeth and Zechariah as narrated in the Gospel account which we have read today. Granted, the conception and subsequent birth of John was extraordinary by all accounts. It even became the talk of the village (cf. Luke 1:65-66). The extraordinary circumstances surrounding his conception and birth notwithstanding, today’s feast celebrates in its entirety the life and person of John the Baptist, a prophet of God and precursor of Jesus Christ. It is a celebration of what John the Baptist represented: “ I will make you a light to the nations so that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth” (cf. Isaiah 49:6). 
The birth of John the Baptist is celebrated because it ushered a new era. In the words of Zechariah his father, the Baptist’s proclamation of the coming of the Lord ushered in an era when the greatest promise of God became fulfilled: God coming to dwell with his people (cf. Luke 1:68). In the birth and ministry of John the Baptist, the old order gives way to a new one (the ministry of the Baptist strides the Old and New Testaments). As Jesus rightly pointed out, the mission of the Baptist was the fulfillment of all the prophecies of old (cf. Matthew 11:13). As a prophet, the Baptist was raised by God to be God’s messenger and mouthpiece (cf. Mark 1:2). He called the people to a life of holiness and a return to the Lord through the repentance of sins (cf. Mark 1:4-5; Luke 3:3). But John was more than a prophet (cf. Matthew 11:9). His ministry prepared the way for the self-revelation of God in Jesus Christ. As the forerunner of the Christ, he had a special role of preparing the hearts of the people for the advent of the Word of God. It was a privileged ministry, one that elevated him from being a mere servant of God as the other prophets had been. God made John the Baptist a light to the nations, a ministry that was properly Israel’s (cf. Genesis 12:1-3; Isaiah 49:1-6). As such, in the ministry of St. John the Baptist, the promises that God had made to Israel are fulfilled. It is for this reason that the Baptist’s ministry strides the mission of the prophets of old and that of Jesus Christ.
It is in Jesus Christ that God’s salvation reaches the ends of the earth. It is in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ that God’s light reaches the darkest parts of the universe, for Jesus Christ is himself that light. But John the Baptist was privileged to share in that ministry. Jesus’ ministry continued that which was begun in the prophets of old and fulfilled in the ministry of the Baptist (the reason why the Baptist had to decrease at the onset of Jesus’ public ministry). The Baptist laid the foundation upon which Jesus built his ministry. While it is true that the other prophets were also forerunners of Jesus Christ, only John the Baptist was privileged to introduce him and set rolling the wheels of his ministry.