The Transfiguration of the Lord is always August 6. It falls on a Thursday this year. It is not a Holyday of Obligation, but it is a significant event in Jesus’ story. We read the account of the Transfiguration every year on the Second Sunday of Lent, but we place it in a distinctive setting celebrating it during Ordinary Time outside of the penitential nature of Lent. Jesus is transfigured, that is to say, Peter, James, and John see him in all his glory in his divine form. (Remember that Peter, James, and John were the ones that he took with him away from the other disciples when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night before he died). Jesus is both human and divine. Moses and Elijah appear. Moses represents the law, and Elijah represents the prophets. This story tells us that Jesus came to fulfill everything found in the law and in the prophets.
An unusual thing about this event is the way that St. Peter refers to it in his letter. St. Peter says that he was an “eyewitness” and saw Jesus in his majesty and heard the “voice from heaven.” We don’t often read about a corroboration of a gospel story in one of the letters. The letter gives authenticity to the account as Peter describes what the event meant to him. As Peter says, “You will do well to be attentive to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.” 2 Peter 1:19. [I love the image.]
If you have a moment, consider these words from today’s Preface: “For he revealed his glory in the presence of chosen witnesses and filled with the greatest splendor that bodily form which he shares with all humanity, that the scandal of the Cross might be removed from the hearts of his disciples and that he might show how in the body of the whole Church is to be fulfilled what so wonderfully shone forth first in its Head.”
OR: Here is the same text from the older Sacramentary: “He revealed his glory to the disciples to strengthen them for the scandal of the cross. His glory shone from a body like our own, to show that the Church which is the body of Christ, would one day share his glory.”
What does the image of the Body of Christ mean to you? How are you part of that Body?
