Homily for the 2nd Sunday in Lent | February 28

Click here to read the Sunday readings from the USCCB website.

So in today’s Gospel we hear the familiar story of the Transfiguration.  It says in here that “Then Peter said to Jesus in reply” but Jesus hasn’t said anything to Peter, but this incident, what he has seen, it has spoken to Peter, and he is replying to that.  

Jesus didn’t say anything verbally but he spoke to them through this vision, and it is still speaking to us today, it is saying that there is something more than just what we see on this earth.

There is always something more in our world too, think about sports, a team, when they start the season, all they can see is their regular season schedule, but if they do well, they get to move on to the postseason, and fight for the championship, right?

It’s never just oh, hey, you played a bunch of games this year in the regular season, you win the trophy, every team wins a trophy.  Think about if the Wahlert girls basketball team beat Waverly the other night, and the officials came out and said, oh you both win, you both get to go to state, that would really hurt our sense of justice, wouldn’t it?  That’s not fair, in our world, there is always a winner and a loser.

With the vision of the transfiguration, what it speaks to us is, “this is our immortal trophy,” if we choose to fight for it, if we compete for it here on earth based on if we love well, if we love God,  if we love one another, and if we love ourselves.  Love is a choice, so the competition is with ourselves and how we choose to love every day.

There is competition and we need to know what we are competing for - the Transfiguration represents the trophy of a life well lived.  It shows physical evidence of an afterlife, and it shows the importance of the human body.

We have an immortal soul, and when we die, it goes one of two places, Heaven or hell.  And in Heaven, at some point, we will actually receive our transfigured body back, just like Jesus demonstrated here to the Apostles.  Our glorified body will be our final trophy.

We are meant to live forever in the land of the living, to walk with God forever if we choose to love Him here on earth.  When Jesus showed this revelation to His apostles, He was trying to prepare them for when He would die.

At that time, there was kind of a split in Jewish thinking or theology.  The Pharisees believed in a postseason, I mean, believed in an afterlife, but the Sadducees did not, they thought nothing happened, life was just over. (Sad - you - see)

So Jesus did not want to leave His Apostles with any doubt that there was an afterlife, so they were shown this vision of two great fathers of faith to prove that there was something more, and through His transfiguration, Jesus showed that even their physical body was still going to be important and live on forever.

Jesus knew that His crucifixion, His suffering and death was going to be so traumatic, that He wanted to give His apostles something to hold on to in order that they would realize there was something more to look forward to, life after death.

Why did Jesus have to go through this? Why did he have to suffer and die for our sins?  He did it out of love for us.  We get a glimpse of this through our first two readings.  

Abraham, we hear, was asked to sacrifice his only son. This might seem mean on God’s part to test him by forcing him to sacrifice his son, but it really just showed how much he loved God.  The messenger said to Abraham, “I know now how devoted you are to God, since you did not withhold from me your own beloved son.”

Our father in faith Abraham proved how much he loved and trusted God in this moment. 

This was a trial.  Could you imagine if you started your season with the Championship Game?  It wouldn’t make any sense… the reason you run wind sprints until you are about to throw up, (do you still run ladders? I hated ladders…) the reason we train our bodies as athletes is to put them through trials so we can be prepared for the big game.

Sometimes we go through trials on earth, sometimes they are given by God, most of the times they are given to us by other people who use their free will poorly, who choose to love poorly, but we encounter trials which strengthen us for the next time.  If we choose to love as best we can in those moments, that is like running spiritual wind sprints, it is spiritual conditioning.

Abraham was put to the test, it was like the championship game, and since he put his trust in God, showed his love for God, God greatly blessed him.  God loves us too, and He wants to bless us, especially as we choose to grow in love and in our trust in Him.

We hear that in our second reading, “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all, how will he not also give us everything else along with him?”

So He loves us so much that He wants us to have Heaven with Him.  He wants us to be blessed and to give us all of the good things that He can give.  

Jesus shows us this heavenly transformation in the Transfiguration today, and it still speaks to us, this revelation still shows us that there is something more than what we see here on earth.  

When we die, life is changed, not ended, and Jesus was preparing His Apostles then, and He still prepares us now, so that we will walk in His ways, so that we will turn ever closer to Him, that we will choose to love God, our neighbor, and ourselves.

Knowing that He loves us, we continue to grow in love with Him, we continue to put our trust in him, and this revelation is just one of the ways that we know that love.

As we continue with Lent, let us recognize that our Lenten observances that we have undertaken are meant to draw us closer to God. Just as Abraham was already close to God, this trial drew him even closer to God.  The apostles as well, by going through this with Jesus on the mountain, this drew them closer to God too.

I hope that your Lenten observances of prayer, fasting and almsgiving are drawing you closer to God. I hope that whatever you do, however you choose to love, that your focus always turns to God, knowing that He loves you and cares for you and would give anything to have you in heaven, including His only begotten Son.