(UNDATED) In the Christian calendar, we officially left behind the Christmas season behind on Tuesday (Jan. 6) when we moved into the Feast of Epiphany, or, as I like to think of it, the Feast of Aha!

Depending on what part of Christendom you hail from, Epiphany commemorates the three Magis’ visit to the newborn Jesus and/or the public baptism of the adult Jesus by John the Baptist.

Both events mark the same thing, essentially: Jesus’ introduction to the world as the Son of God, divine, the Savior, the Chosen One, in whom God was well-pleased.

An epiphany, in its strictly religious sense, is when the Divine reveals something to a person (or to humanity).

In a more secular sense, an epiphany is a sudden realization. Of the big picture. Of something hidden. Of the missing puzzle piece. Of clarity in the midst of chaos.

Of the true meaning, a heart’s desire, a calling, a lesson. Of the reason why.

Epiphanies can be monumental or barely discernable. But they can change everything. Always a surprise, they creep up on us when we’re not paying attention, appearing to be serendipitous but in fact divinely designed and deployed.

When the poet William Wordsworth wrote about epiphany in his masterpiece “The Prelude,” he describes them as sometimes arriving “by chance collisions and quaint accidents.”

They are as indelible as they are fleeting, mere glimpses of the eternal or transcendent. Wordsworth described them like a strobe of light that “gleams like the flashing of a shield.”

A few weeks back, on the first Sunday of Advent, our parish priest reminded us that in Advent we are asked to “keep awake,” to be watchful, to be alert and look for signs of what is coming next.

As we begin a new year, many of us are wondering-perhaps anxiously, after the doozy of a year 2008 was-what will happen next.

When will the real change begin? What will happen in Gaza? When will peace arrive? When will our hopes be fulfilled? What do we do now?

Will I find real love? Will I have a job? Will we have a baby? Will I be healthy? Will I be happy? When?

Keep your eyes peeled. An epiphany may be just around the next corner.

A few days ago, I checked in with Kathy, one of my closest friends. Last year, she went through a horrendous divorce-the kind of divorce that Lifetime miniseries are made of. Awful, with a capital A. But she survived and is stronger, happier, healthier and surprised by a kind of joy she never could have anticipated.

As she recounted her recent New Year’s festivities, Kathy found herself looking back on last New Year’s Eve-when 2007 flipped to 2008.

“I had gone to a friend’s apartment for a very low-key night. I remember leaving their place right after midnight and walking the nine blocks back to my empty apartment. As I watched all the drunk, puking 20-somethings all around me, I was overcome by a feeling that everything was going to be OK,” she said.

“That was the first time I had felt that since the whole breakup and divorce had started. I was so glad I was me, and my life was mine. I wanted to throw my hat in the air like Mary Tyler Moore and sing, `I’m going to make it after all,”‘ she said. “It was really cool to realize that moment was a whole year ago.”

And that was her epiphany.

Some folks will argue that those kinds of epiphanies are emotional or intellectual, that they occur outside the realm of the religious or the spiritual.

But I was taught that all truth-no matter what about, who says it or where it comes from-is God’s truth.

Realizing that you’re happy in your own skin, that you’re where you’re meant to be, glad to be shed of something (or someone) unhealthy, and everything is going to be OK (despite all sorts of evidence to the contrary), is a profound truth. A divine truth.

So, in this new year, be on the lookout for what John Milton called “everyday epiphanies”-for those flashes of clarity, insight, truth and light that can, the poet said, “change forever how we experience life and the world.”

When the “Aha!” comes, and it will, seize it and hold on tightly-even after the glimmer is gone.

(Cathleen Falsani is a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, and author of the new book “Sin Boldly: A Field Guide for Grace.”)

KRE/DEA END FALSANI