Fr. Roger J. Landry

Conversations with Consequences Podcast

Homily for the Transfiguration of the Lord, A, Vigil

August 5, 2023

 

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

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/8.5.23_Transfiguration_A_1.mp3

 

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 the Risen Lord Jesus wants to have with each of us this Sunday, as we, like the apostles Peter, James and John, will accompany Jesus up an exceedingly high mountain and witness him transfigured in glory. As you know, every Second Sunday of Lent we make this journey as we focus on how Jesus, through giving his three closest apostles a foretaste of his divine glory, was preparing them for when they would see him transfigured in blood, pain and suffering on Good Friday. We focus then on how Jesus spoke there with the great Old Testament figures of the law and the prophets, respectively, Moses and Elijah, about the upcoming “exodus” Jesus was to accomplish in Jerusalem, when Jesus, just as Moses led the Israelites from slavery through the Red Sea and the desert to the promised land, would lead us, through the waters of baptism into his death and the desert of the Christian life into the eternal promised land of heaven. Every year, however, since 1456, the Roman Catholic Church has also celebrated the Transfiguration on August 6, as a means by which we can focused on Jesus’ glory in its own right and on the other lessons of this important scene in the life of Jesus, which, since 2002, has constituted the fourth Luminous mystery of the Rosary we ponder each Thursday.

* What are those lessons?

* The first is the exertion Jesus calls us to make as disciples. He never tells us to stay right where we are, but summons us to a journey, to follow him up an exceedingly high mountain, indeed to the heavenly Jerusalem. The Christian life is a dynamic and demanding adventure with Jesus as our alpine guide.

* The second lesson is about the importance of prayer. Jesus took the apostles on that journey precisely so that they might pray. To pray is to contemplate God. It’s far more than an exchange of words or ideas, but an exchange of persons, as God comes to abide in us and have us abide in him. This mutual indwelling is summarized by the experience of contemplation. Just this past Friday, August 4, we celebrated the Memorial of the patron saint of parish priests, St. John Mary Vianney, the Curé of Ars, who loved to talk about the art of prayer with the words one of his parishioners, the farmer Louis Chaffangeon, who, when his pastor asked him what he was doing as he knelt before the tabernacle in Church, replied, “Je l’avise et il m’avise.” “I’m looking at him and he’s looking at me.” Prayer is an exchange of loving glances as we look at God and he looks at us and the whole process transforms us to look at ourselves, the world and others with the loving eyes of God. The presence of Moses and Elijah teaches us about how Sacred Scripture speaks of Jesus, about his life, passion, death and ultimately resurrection. The cloud that descends at the top of the mountain reminds us that prayer is, as the great Latin aphorism attests, both lumen etnumen, both light and cloud, but we’ll be given certain insights but much, because of our finite capacities, will remain shrouded in mystery. And God the Father’s instruction from the cloud, “This is my beloved Son: listen to Him,” reminds us that prayer is ultimately about our allowing Jesus to speak and seeking out of love to align our life to what he asks.