Transfigured By God’s Gaze: The Second Sunday in Lent 2020

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    Transfigured By God’s Gaze:

The Second Sunday in Lent 2020

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March 8, 2020

Genesis 12:1-4; Psalm 33; 2 Timothy 1:8-10; Matthew 17:1-9

We get the heavy hitters of the Hebrew Scriptures in this week’s readings and the transfiguration of Jesus puts a twist in how Christians regard these figures. Abraham, the father of the faith, the one who showed great trust in God, enough to leave his homeland to wander at an advanced age, becomes surpassed by the obedience of faith of Jesus. Moses, the Freedom Fighter and Lawgiver, who gave us right relations with God under the law, is supplanted by Jesus who gives us the law of mercy and eternal life. Elijah, the great prophet who ascended to heaven on a chariot of fire, the one who guided us into the way of deeper trust, is replaced by the one who will abide by us forever because of his victory over sin and death. The Law, the prophets, the obedience of faith become centered around the person of Jesus, the beloved one of God. Jesus stands above all other biblical figures.

What was the Transfiguration of Jesus all about? It was about the power of love. It was simply that God loved him, Jesus received that adoration, and God’s glory was able to shine forth through him. We are likewise changed when we accept God’s loving gaze upon us, but most of us have a stumbling block because we do not think we are worthy of God’s love. Some of us don’t like the decisions we have made in life or the way life turned out and we determine that God will not like us because of our choices. Perhaps, it is as basic as we get angry often or we are majorly judgmental, or we think awful thoughts about another person. We do not like those aspects about ourselves and we cannot change the way we are. How in the world would God like us with those attributes and character flaws? The answer is: Loving us is not up to us.

God’s love perfects us. When God looks upon us, God adores us just the way he did Jesus. Perfect love never sees perceived failure, sin, disappointments, or weaknesses. It simply cannot. Perfect love encourages, builds up, cherishes, adores, and honors. It sees promise and beauty and admiration. As self-appointed judges of ourselves, we cannot see our sweeping goodness and righteousness because we know better. We can see our faults and shortcomings, and few can properly love us because we cannot properly love ourselves. It all begins with sitting in the presence of God and permitting God to warm gaze upon us and receiving the affection God has for us.

We cannot adequately love another person until we love ourselves adequately. In the Transfiguration, Jesus stood on that mountain and received God’s warm gaze. In our daily prayer, we can sit before God and be beheld by God the very same way. When God looks upon us, God is able to feel what we feel, to empathize with our sufferings and joys, despairs and hopes, and God can sit back in amazement and say, “You take my breath away. I’m very pleased with you, the one I created. I want to hold and behold you, laugh with you, cry with you, but mostly sit in wonder and in awe of the person that you are. I want to enjoy being in your presence.” When we have finished our prayer, we cannot but feel more transfigured, more centered, more known, more loved.

This is the way we are to go throughout our day. Part of our prayer during mass is that we ask God “not to look upon our sins, but upon our faith.” Let go of your practice of looking at your sins; look, rather, upon your goodness and watch it grow. Be patient with yourself. Be good and gentle to yourselves. Lent is about living in the knowledge that we are redeemed, and our expressions ought to be of relief, joy, and happiness. So, sit back, come before God who wants to delight in your presence and just stay there, doing nothing, but let God spoil you rotten.

Scripture for Daily Mass

First Reading: 

Monday: (Daniel 9) We have rebelled against you God and sinned, but you have remained faithful to us in the covenant. You, O Lord, have justice on your side.

Tuesday: (Isaiah 1) Wash yourselves clean and make justice your aim. Obey the commandments and take care of your neighbor.

Wednesday: (Jeremiah 18) The people of Judah contrived against Jeremiah to destroy him by his own words.

Thursday: (Jeremiah 17) Cursed is the one who trusts in human beings. More tortuous than all else is the human heart. The Lord alone probes the mind and tests the heart. 

Friday: (Genesis 37) Israel loved Joseph best of all, which created resentment among his brothers, who later sold him into slavery for twenty pieces of silver.

Saturday: (Micah 7) God removes guilt and pardons sins and does not persist in anger.

Gospel: 

Monday: (Luke 6) Jesus said, “Be merciful,” and “Stop judging because you will be judged by the way you judge.”

Tuesday: (Matthew 23) The scribes and Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses. Be wary of someone’s teaching if they have no integrity between their words and actions.

Wednesday: (Matthew 20) As Jesus went up to Jerusalem, he told his disciples, “Behold. The Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests, condemned to death, handed over to Gentiles, an crucified, and will be raised on the third day.”

Thursday: (Luke 16) A rich man dressed in purple garments died shortly after Lazarus, a beggar. In heaven, Lazarus was rewarded and the rich man was tormented in hell. He appealed to God to spare his family, but was told that they would not listen to Moses or to anyone who was raised from the dead.

Friday: (Matthew 21) Jesus told the parable of a vineyard owner, who entrusted the land to servants, but these men seized the land and possessed it. They killed the servants and the heir. When the owner returned, he cast the wretched men into a tormented death.

Saturday: (Luke 15) Jesus is accused of welcoming sinners and eats with them. He then tells the story of the prodigal one who was well received by his father upon his return. The one who was lost has been found.

Saints of the Week

March 8: John of God (1495-1550), was a Portuguese soldier of fortune who was brought to Spain as a child. He was a slave master, shepherd, crusader, bodyguard and peddler. As he realized that he frittered away his life, he sought counsel from John of Avila. He then dedicated his life to care for the sick and the poor. He formed the Order of Brothers Hospitallers and is the patron saint of hospitals and the sick.

March 9: Frances of Rome (1384-1440), was born into a wealthy Roman family and was married at age 13. She bore six children and when two died in infancy, she worked to bring the needs of the less fortunate to others. She took food to the poor, visited the sick, cared for the needy in their homes. When other women joined in her mission, they became Benedictine oblates. She founded a monastery for them after her husband's death.

This Week in Jesuit History

·      Mar 8, 1773. At Centi, in the diocese of Bologna, Cardinal Malvezzi paid a surprise visit to the Jesuit house, demanding to inspect their accounting books.

·      Mar 9, 1764. In France, all Jesuits who refused to abjure the Society were ordered by Parliament to leave the realm within a month. Out of 4,000 members only five priests, two scholastics, and eight brothers took the required oath; the others were driven into exile.

·      Mar 10, 1615. The martyrdom in Glasgow, Scotland, of St John Ogilvie.

·      Mar 11, 1848. In Naples, Italy, during the 1848 revolution, 114 Jesuits, after much suffering, were put into carts and driven ignominiously out of the city and the kingdom.

·      Mar 12, 1622. Pope Gregory XV canonized Sts Ignatius, Francis Xavier, Teresa of Avila, and Philip Neri.

·      Mar 13, 1568. John Segura and five companions set sail from Spain for Florida, a fertile field of martyrs. (Nine Jesuits were killed there between 1566 and 1571.)

·      Mar 14, 1535. Ignatius received his degree from the University of Paris.