II Sunday Lent, Cycle C

Gn15:5-12, 17-18
Ps 27:1, 7-8, 8-9, 13-14
Phil 3:17-4:1
Lk 9:28b-36

How many of you have kept your Lenten promises?  If you have broken your promises, no worries – get back on it, don’t give up.  Penances and disciplines that you take up are for your relationship with God, not for anyone else’s benefit.  Those who have lacked the perseverance in promises are in good company with today’s readings.  We hear in the first and third readings of some people snoozing when great things are happening.

In the first reading, God is revealing this covenant for Abram, the promise of countless descendents – numerous as the stars in the sky.  A rough estimate is around 10^24 stars in the universe, 10^12 in our galaxy alone.  That’s a lot of stars!  Abram asks God for a sign and prepares this curious sacrifice.  But as Abram was waiting for the sign, he fell asleep – he fell into a trance and only then did the vision come to pass.  Although the sacrifice is strange, the covenant from God is a promise that would be fulfilled in Jesus.

For the three disciples: Peter, James, and John, the same thing happens in the story of the Transfiguration in the Gospel today.  We have three guys falling asleep as Jesus goes up the mountain to pray and almost miss a miraculous moment of the divine.  Luke’s Gospel is the only Gospel where Jesus’ purpose is specified and I would not be surprised if the author of the Gospel intended to connect a later time where these sleep-deprived disciples would doze off while Jesus was praying: in the Garden of Gethsemane.

I would like to speak a little on how today’s Gospel fits into the theme of Lent and its place in the scriptures.  On a side note, most of what I say to today comes from Pope Benedict’s book Jesus of Nazareth, which is great intellectual spiritual reading for Lent.  The story of the Transfiguration comes eight days after Peter’s great pronouncement that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah of God.  The mention of “eight days” is significant.

According to Pope Benedict, the number of days between the confession of Peter and the Transfiguration, is the number of days between the Jewish feasts of Yom Kippur and the Feast of Booths.  Yom Kippur is the Jewish Day of Atonement – it is the day when the Jewish people as a community atone for their sins and the only day in the year where the name of God may be spoken aloud by the High Priest.

Coincidentally if not really providentially, this is the same day that St. Peter announces who Jesus is: the Son of God.  With the Jewish day of Yom Kippur as a backdrop, St. Peter’s declaration has a nice theological, if not really a poetic impact of the significance of Jesus’ identity.  The identity of Christ, if you read the passage, is intimately tied with His prediction of His passion, death, and resurrection – so keep that in the back of your minds.  As for the Feast of Booths, this is the Jewish feast where they make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and tents are setup as with prayers and food.  It commemorates the Jews’ forty years in the desert and God’s providence in bringing them out of slavery from Egypt.  This occurs one week after Yom Kippur – therefore putting the story of the Transfiguration at the same time as the Feast of Booths.

The Jewish feasts all point to three realities: the natural (God’s providence in creation), the historical (God’s providence for the people), and finally a future event of hope (God’s final fulfillment of promise and covenant) (cf. Ratzinger, Joseph. Jesus of Nazareth, p. 307) Fittingly so, the celebration of the Mass does the same thing.  One cannot help but see the connection of the Feast of Booths – the remembrance of the exodus, from the desert into the Promised Land – and the Transfiguration – where the conversation between Moses and Elijah speaks of the exodus of Jesus; that ends in Jerusalem as a fulfillment of God’s promise.  Ironically, Peter’s strange almost non sequitur suggestion of setting up tents actually makes sense in that he is ready to commemorate the fulfillment of the glory of God – he is identified God a week ago and now here is the proof, the fulfillment.  The problem is Jesus had not yet completed His task and purpose here on earth.

Therefore the Transfiguration, if you are still following me, is a sign of the future fulfillment of the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus.  You will notice that Jesus’ face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white.  Unlike Moses whose radiant face reflected the radiance of God from conversing with Him, it was Jesus’ face that transformed and simply radiated.  Why?  Looking at the Creed we have a hint– God from God, Light from Light, True God from True God.  Jesus’ face cannot help but be transformed because of His intimate conversation with God; His very Being resonates with the Father’s Being, the consubstantial beings radiate.  Believe it or not, we should be able to do the same through our very baptism because we are made in His image and we are His children.  How many times have you prayed, and your face became radiant?

But going back to the Transfiguration and the conversation with Moses and Elijah, we see that these two figures represent the Law and the Prophets – all of the Old Testament summed up in these two figures.  Just in case there is any doubt as Jesus’ purpose, we have three men to witness this radical fulfillment of what Moses and Elijah had setup in the Old Testament: the final exodus – Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection.  The exodus for Jesus is also our exodus as then we are set free from sin and slavery to sin. We live freely in Christ who has redeemed us in Jerusalem, which brings us to the here and now.  How have we been set free?  Are we still slaves to sin?  Slaves to our bad habits and vices?

St. Paul says, be imitators of me, brothers and sisters, and observe those who thus conduct themselves according to the model you have in us. We have the benefit of St. Paul and all the saints to help us in this Lenten journey.  Don’t look at those who would lead you astray.  Again, we are looking at people’s example and not for judgment and condemnation.  In this time of Lent do not serve the god of stomachs – the appetites, the whims and desires, but rather struggle forward fighting against that which will take us away from God and hurt our relationship with Him.  Renew and make those Lenten sacrifices real during Lent.  Remember, stand firm in the Lord and we will be changed as St. Paul promises: our lowly body to conform with His glorified body.  Let us glory in the Transfiguration of Christ as He leads the way to Jerusalem and ultimately to the Cross! Our journey to Jerusalem, our journey in the desert is not only but to journey with Christ — that we may die and rise with Him.

cf. Ratzinger, Joseph. Jesus of Nazareth, p. 307

I would like to ask your prayers especially for our Holy Father, Pope Benedict, as we are coming into the last week of his pontificate.  I also would like to ask you to pray especially for the next Pope.  We need a holy man of God to lead this Church, especially in this day and age. Though we trust in the Holy Spirit’s guidance, the Church is still very much a human institution and she needs our prayers.