2nd Sunday in Lent,
There must be a reason why
the Church has put the gospel of the Transfiguration of our Lord into the
Lenten season. After last week’s offering–the Gospel about His holy fast of
forty days and the repulsive advances of the Devil–today’s Gospel is all light
and glory. Quite a contrast. In a way, it seems not to
belong to this very sober, if not somber, season.
The answer to the question
must surely be that this gospel is, in some way, a preparation for the Passion
and Resurrection of Christ. And indeed, the other versions of this spectacle,
Sts. Mark and Matthew both mention his forthcoming resurrection from the dead–a
thing that was for the moment incomprehensible to them. St. Luke does not
mention this connection and leaves us without the benefit of that reference,
but does speak of the Lord’s ‘exodus.’
In my imagination, the
cinematográphic picture of what happened that day is astounding. You would have
to try to picture it in your own mind’s eye. See Jesus rapt in prayer. Then,
suddenly, His face begins to shine, as if a light were illuminating it from the
inside, and then His clothes appear as white as can be, and radiant. Then
the apparition of two others, and finally a cloud covers the three men and a
headless voice is heard. This was an event that was so transcendent, so
miraculous, as to have caused a near deathly fright, but also an ecstatic joy
in the witnessing disciples. What could have been the reason for this display?
If last week our Lord seemed
to be almost too human in allowing Himself
temptation by the devil, today He seems in His humanity as almost too divine.
The truth is, of course, that our Lord has both a divine and a human nature,
but that He is the very Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, God among us.
What we call the Transfiguration was really then what we perhaps might more
naturally think of if someone ignorant of Christianity were to speculate on what
it would look like for God to become man. He would have to show glory. And if
that is true, then His ordinary appearance in looking like any man of His time,
would have actually been a withholding of divine splendor. Surely, that’s only
a manner of speaking, however, since God can do all He wills. But that is how
it must seem.
Transfiguration is indeed
about how things seem–or, better, about how things are in reality. The
facial and bodily aspect of Christ underwent a change on this mountain–a
change, shall we say,
for the better?–in that His humanity was enhanced, illuminated
from the inner resources of His divine nature. And since His subject of
conversation with Moses and Elijah had to do about what St. Luke here calls our
Lord’s ‘exodus’, his passing from death to the resurrection, then this
extraordinarily refulgent body of Jesus was given the disciples to see for a
reason relating to the Passion and resurrection, or so I believe.
The testimony of the bible,
the evidence of our Lord’s burial Shroud, and the writings of mystics who had
been privy to some intimate details about our Lord’s sufferings, all indicate
that Jesus must have suffered an extremely cruel series of punishments in His
Passion. His resulting appearance would have been unbecoming of human dignity,
let alone of the dignity of the incarnate God. Scripture, speaking
prophetically of Him, says that he was more a worm than a man, and that His
aspect was so marred that his look was “beyond human semblance.” Thus from
superman in the Transfiguration to sub-man in His Passion: our Lord’s
appearance was indeed changeable; and always for a reason.
Easter morning revealed yet
another transformation of Jesus’ appearance. His disciples, who would have
recognized Him instantaneously, were restrained from knowing Him after he had
risen. Again, His humanity had changed in how He appeared to the eyes of men.
There truly must have been a reason for all this changing of our Lord’s visage
and we would do well to speculate about its significance.
My own conviction is that
Jesus altered His appearance to accommodate Himself to our varying needs. In
His Passion, He wanted to show us by His dis-figuration the extreme love that
made Him endure the cross so as to win our love in return. His shining appearance
at the Transfiguration was needed to bolster the disciples, the three chosen
ones who would later be with Him in the Gethsemani–so that they could endure
seeing Him so “marred in appearance” in the Passion. But the advantage for us,
in Jesus’ shifting guises, is the preparation for our full acceptance of His
long-lasting change of looks in the Holy Eucharist. Isn’t it interesting that,
after the resurrection, our Lord’s disciples, who couldn’t read His identity at
first, came to figure out who He was only after he had “broken the bread,” a
biblical expression for the Holy Eucharist? From ordinary human looks, to
translucent looks, to sub-human looks, to inanimate bread-looks, it is the same
body of Christ, now under one form and now under another. This last
transfiguration, the looks of bread, was, like the others, given us for a
reason: to indicate that He is the food to keep us supernaturally alive and
that, through this simplest of appearances, we might approach Him without fear
and trembling and thus draw from Him his life-giving Self.
Now perhaps we can see the
logic of this Gospel following that of last Sunday. When our Lord was hungry
from fasting, the devil proposed a magical act for food. Had our Lord succumbed
to the devil–which, certainly He would not, could not–it would have meant for
us the negation of faith and trust in the supernatural order. Life for us would
mean only the here and now, the concerns of this world only, of bread, of
money, of eating, drinking. living and dying. Not by
earthly bread alone: this was Jesus’ reply. The soul’s requires a supernatural
food to keep for its celestial existence. This is the food of Christ’s flesh
and the drink of His blood. The Eucharist is the last transfiguration of
Christ. And Communion is also God’s medicinal treatment for our bodies to
become transfigured–even though we have to wait until the last day to enjoy its
full effect.
When you approach Holy
Communion today, our Lord will be in a transfigured state. He will have the
appearance of bread and wine but the flesh and blood of Christ distributed to
you is every bit as much alive as the flesh and blood of the hand of the priest
giving you Holy Communion.
To anyone who has the true,
orthodox Catholic faith, this is the cause of the greatest joy for us. “Master,
it is good that we are here.” I hope that you will ever appreciate, cherish,
love and adore the very Presence of Jesus, in His divinity united to His sacred
Humanity, that is the single greatest treasure of the
Catholic Church. One day the guises will be forever removed and we, fitted with
splendorous bodies, hope to be able to see Him face to face: our glorified
faces to His Glorified Face.