(Giovani Bellini, 1490)
Gn 12: 1-4a
2 Tm 1: 8b - 10
Mt 17: 1-9
Sunday Word: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/031217.cfm
It is true
that in order to be a good conversationalist we need to be a listener even more.
I think this human art has been lost these days. We live at a time of information overload,
social media, and endless analysis of the daily events political, economic,
religious and social. While the internet
is a rich source of information and communication it is also a powerful and at
times addictive tool which can affect our personal and cultural lives in some
very negative ways. Opinion as told us,
we shout and scream, demand that we be heard, we express our opinion we speak
over another as they as speaking. So, we must be on guard and discern wisely
what we hear and read about. What can be
a message of light and what can bring us to greater darkness? We ask, “Do I
really listen in order to understand?” Can I hear what is being said or have I
lost that art?
This
second Sunday of our Lenten journey brings us face to face with a moment to
listen. On the mountain we see Jesus and
three of his Apostles: Peter, James and
John. I’ve wondered why these three and
not Matthew, Philip or Andrew or any of the other? Why not just all twelve of them
together?
Well, we
can’t presume to know what was in the mind of Jesus but history may reveal some
reason. Peter would become the “rock” of
the Church; the flawed but essential sign of the unity Jesus prayed for. James would become the first leader of the
Jerusalem Church and the first of the Apostles to die a martyr’s death. John would later be given care of Mary,
Jesus’ mother, after his death and resurrection. John would live the longest of all the
Apostles and eventually bring the Church to the end of its first century. He
was personally known by some of the already successors of his Apostle brethren
martyred before his own death.
Be that as
it may, these three were obviously significant in the mind of our Lord and to
them he sought to reveal a great truth.
He caught their attention and despite Peter’s sincere shout out, they
were called to listen and understand.
The future knowledge of the nature of Christ and the unity of the Church
would demand it.
So, in a
moment of strange transformation, on the mountain these three encounter a new
vision of Jesus never seen before – a shadow of his resurrection. His face “shone like the sun and his clothes became
white as light.” And the great prophets, Moses and Elijah, who bring
together the Law and the Prophets, are seen speaking with Jesus. Then to add to the overwhelming vision, a “bright cloud cast a shadow over them” and
“a voice that said, ‘This is my beloved
Son . . . listen to Him.’”
Now if a human
face is suddenly transfigured to a human
form filled with glory, that shines like the sun, two long ago dead significant
Jewish figures appearing, a cloud that shines and a voice that booms from it
doesn’t cause you to stop and listen, nothing ever will! Certainly, this was
not a Hollywood special effect but rather a deep truth uncovered for these
future leaders of the Church.
That is, Jesus
is not a normal human being. That his
nature is both human and divine; that his mission is beyond this world and that
he has come in the line of the prophets as the sign of God’s new Covenant,
originally established through Abram (our first reading from Genesis) and Moses
as the final fulfillment of that sacred Law.
For three Jews to witness such an event it would have all come together
in a profound way. God has fulfilled his
promise to Israel and to all of humanity.
This is God’s answer to our sinful disobedience which estranged us from
God. (Recall last Sunday’s story of Adam and Eve from Genesis 2). Now, in Christ, his future passion, death and
resurrection, a new and eternal Covenant is established between God and humanity.
Still, why not build three tents? Why
not hold on to this glory?
Once Peter
has been silenced in order to get his attention all the more, and after the
awestruck fear of the three, there stands Jesus alone as they have known
him. With him, there is no other nor
will there be. Yet, this awesome display of other world glory was only
temporary. Here Jesus strengthened them
for the days ahead – a time of no glory but suffering and passion; the seeming
failure of a mission with the best of intentions. This was an encounter they would need to
never forget for beyond the suffering Messiah, there would come greater glory
in the resurrection when the full story would be uncovered of Jesus’ identity
and mission, which is now that of the Church.
For now, hold on to this but bring it down the mountain for future
reference when the mission will carry on beyond Jerusalem to the entire
world.
That
mission began with Abram when God asked a very risky and shocking thing of an
old man who by now had settled down albeit apparently not rooted or fixed.
Still, with no legacy in sons to leave behind progeny, we can only speculate
that Abram may have given in to some level of sadness in, “this is as good as
it gets.”
God asked
Abram to begin again. To listen to his
command and to “Go forth from the land of
your kinsfolk . . .” With a divine promise only to go on, Abram went
trusting that God “. . . will make of you
a great nation.” Abram’s example is forever of one who listened without
question and obeyed a command that gave little in detail. He was able to obey because he listened first
only to now see on the mountain who would finally carry this promise to
completion.
In the
end, the grace of God is given to us all so that we may listen more attentively
in order to recognize the voice of God in our own moments of change or
transfiguration. We are not changed as
Christ was before his startled three of course but God provides moments for us
to listen and understand. This Lent is
always a time for us to stop talking and to listen to God that we may be
changed.
In prayer,
in charitable service, in the sacraments, in compassion for another, at a time
when we include another without judgement and recognize their human dignity, in
the sacred Word of God, in the Holy Eucharist, in spiritual reading, in a tough
time I’ve endured, in the sickness of another or a word spoken to me or who
known where and how and when God will call our attention to himself and demand
our ear. All these are moments of encounter with Christ but do I hear him? It
may not be a shining face, a voice from clouds above or even at a mountain top
moment. How, when or where God will speak to us we will never know if we are
not paying attention or wrapped in our own preconceived perception of holiness
or self - righteousness.
Peter,
James and John are more like us than we may admit. They needed to learn and to be formed in the
Gospel truth of who Jesus was and who he remains but they eventually made the
grade. They learned to listen to him.
At Mass we hear his Word and we encounter his living presence in the Eucharist - are we changed by him? Let's pray this Lent teaches us to listen more and talk less that by his grace we may be changed for Easter resurrection.
O God, who have commanded us
to listen to your beloved Son,
be pleased, we pray,
to nourish us inwardly by your word,
that, with spiritual sight made pure,
we may rejoice to behold your glory.
(From Collect of Mass)
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