Second Sunday of Lent (C), Conversations with Consequences Podcast, March 12, 2022

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the Second Sunday of Lent, C, Vigil
March 12, 2022

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below: 

The following text guided the homily:

• This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a privilege for me to be with you as we enter into the consequential conversation Jesus wants to have with us in this Sunday’s Gospel, as together with Peter, James and John and the whole Church, we behold Jesus transfigured among us. It’s a pilgrimage the Church has us make every year with Jesus up the Mount of Transfiguration to strengthen us for the journey of Lent and of human life. This year, as we continue to pray, fast and sacrifice for the people in Ukraine, as we begin to suffer the inevitable financial consequences here at home like higher gas prices, and as some wonder whether we are witnessing the first lethal stages of what could develop into World War III, the lessons we learn take on even greater relevance.
• The first lesson is about exertion, about the effort that a holy Lent and true Christian life entails. Jesus leads Peter, James and John on a hike up what St. Matthew calls an “exceedingly high mountain.” Christian tradition associates the mountain where Jesus was transfigured as Mount Tabor, which towers over Galilee and the Plains of Megiddo, and takes over ten minutes to climb in vans zig-zagging up narrow paths. It would take vigorous climbers at least a couple of hours to ascend on foot. They needed to leave civilization behind, they needed to leave their comfort zones behind, and climb with Jesus, sweating, probably gasping for air, to pray with Jesus. This Lent the Lord is likewise asking of us to make an exertion. He’s calling us to hard work. He’s calling us to be on the move. And the pilgrimage he seeks to have us make with him isn’t in a van. This annual spiritual altitude training, however, is meant to strengthen us for the uphill marathon of life and the inevitable vicissitudes that arise.
• The second Lenten lesson is the help God wants to give us as we make that spiritual and often physical climb. When they reach the top of the mountain, Saints Peter, James and John see something extraordinary. Jesus is transfigured. He and his clothes become radiant. St. Luke tells us that he speaks with Moses and Elijah, the greatest figures in Jewish history who symbolize the law and the prophets, about the “exodus” he was to accomplish in Jerusalem, when Jesus would lead us through the waters of Baptism through the desert of Lent to the Promised Land not flowing with milk and honey but the Living Water that wells up to eternal life. The experience of the various theophanies at the top of the mountain are so powerful they don’t know what to say, but it leads Peter immediately to want to get into real estate, building booths for Jesus, Moses and Elijah, to keep the experience going for as long as possible.
• Why did Jesus want them to have this experience? The reason was ultimately to strengthen them to remain strong in faith even when they would descend the Mount of Transfiguration to ascend Mount Calvary. When they would see Jesus transfigured in blood, they would be able to remember Jesus in glory, when they got a glimpse of his divinity. The Church helps us to capture the reason for Jesus’ transfiguration in the Eucharistic Preface for Mass, in which the priest prays, “For after [Jesus] had told the disciples of his coming Death, on the holy mountain he manifested to them his glory, to show, even by the testimony of the law and the prophets, that the Passion leads to the glory of the Resurrection.” It was to sustain their faith in trial. This vision of Jesus’ glory is what has sustained the faith of the martyrs in making the sacrifice of themselves for God, because they knew that once they breathed their last, they would see Jesus transfigured. I think one of the reasons why we are seeing such courage from so many Ukrainians, especially from the Ukrainian Church, is because the Transfiguration is so central to eastern Christian spirituality, and their celebration of the Divine Liturgy, the Mass, is so self-consciously a foretaste of heaven that they are emboldened to do what’s right, knowing that suffering and death are not the end.
• The final lesson might be the most important. God the Father speaks. He begins by affirming his Son’s identity but then gets to a curious imperative: “This is my beloved Son,” he thunders, “Listen to him!” Listen to him. What had Peter, James and John been doing for the previous two years but listening to Jesus? They listened to him call them from their boats to be fishers of men. They heard all his parables, the Sermon on the Mount and his great Eucharistic discourse. They listened to him teach them how to pray and instruct them as they walked along the dusty way. They listened to him console widows and sinners and lambaste the hypocritical Scribes and Pharisees. They had been listening to him almost constantly since they first met him. But God the Father noticed something that they themselves hadn’t grasped. They had been selectively listening to Jesus and they had been particularly tone deaf to what Jesus had been saying about how he was going to be betrayed, suffer greatly in Jerusalem, be tortured, crucified, killed and on the third day be raised. Even though Jesus told them this at least three times, they didn’t want to hear it, and when Good Friday came, most of them were not within earshot to hear him say his seven last words on Calvary. What they were perhaps even less willing to hear was what Jesus said after he announced his eventual crucifixion and death, namely, “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.” To be his disciple, to follow him, he said, they needed to say no to their earthly ambitions, pick up their cross and all it symbolized, and be crucified with him. God the Father knew that they were ignoring what Jesus was foretelling about his transfiguration in suffering, when instead of dazzling white they would see darkness on earth, and instead of radiant clothes he would be stripped and covered in blood. He knew they were also ignoring Jesus’ summons to follow him all the way. So that’s why he said, “Listen to him!” This Sunday, the same Father gives us the same command. He wants us to listen to everything Jesus his beloved Son teaches, about the glories of the kingdom of heaven, but also about the suffering we may experience on earth, so that we might follow him along the spiritual exodus into eternal life, where not only will he be transfigured, but God willing, we will be glorified.
• On Sunday we will leave our homes not to climb the Mount of Transfiguration but to ascend the altar of God. It’s at Mass that Lent and everything else in our faith finds its source and summit. The Lord wants us to make the exertion to leave our comfort zones and come to be with him. It’s at Mass that we see Jesus transfigured not in glory but in humility. It’s at Mass that we listen to his word, the words of eternal life, and seek to become living commentaries of it. It’s at Mass that we take our prayers to God in a special way, like those we are making for the people in Ukraine, uniting our petitions to Christ’s from Calvary. It’s at Mass that we build a booth for Christ within us. And each time we go to Mass, God give us as a reward for our exertions, as a foretaste of forever, his Beloved Son. As we prepare to behold that Son, the Lamb of God, God the Father says to us, “Do whatever he tells you! Take seriously his words throughout Lent, ‘Repent and Believe!’ and accompany him, on the pilgrimage on which he wants to lead you up the exceedingly high mountain of the Celestial Jerusalem, to my house where I’ve built a booth not only for him, for Moses and for Elijah, but for you!”

The Gospel on which the homily was based was: 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download