Second Sunday of Lent
- Fr. LE Polansky
- Mar 15
- 4 min read
Immaculée Ilibagazia was a 22-year-old Rwandan college student when her world was darkened by evil in 1994. The death of her country’s Hutu president unleashed the slaughter of one million ethnic Tutsis. Because she was a Tutsi, Immaculée’s name was on a death list. She hid in a pastor’s spare bathroom with seven other women for 91 days, praying constantly to be freed from the terror of death. Her devout Catholic parents and siblings were brutally murdered. Immaculée’s prayers were answered when she not only escaped but was able to let go of the anger she had for her persecutors. In her book, Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, Immaculée explains that God left her to “show as many people as possible the healing power of his love and forgiveness.” Her last name, Ilibagazia, is translated “shining and beautiful in body and soul.”
Entrance Antiphon: Ps 27 (26):8-9 – “Of you my heart has spoken: Seek His face. It is Your face, O Lord, that I seek; hide not Your face from me.”
First Reading: Gn 15:5-12, 17-18 – “God made a covenant with Abraham, His faithful servant.”
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 27:1, 7-8, 8-9, 13-14 – “The Lord is my light and my salvation.”
Second Reading: Phil 3:17-4:1 – “Christ will change our lowly body to conform with His glorified body.”
Verse Before the Gospel: Mt 17:5 – “From the shining cloud the Father’s voice is heard: This is My beloved Son, hear Him.”
Gospel: Lk 9:28b-36 – “While He was praying His face changed in appearance and His clothing became dazzling white.”
Communion Antiphon: Mt 17:5 – “From the shining cloud the Father’s voice is heard: This is My beloved Son, hear Him.”
During the season of Lent, we focus on Christ’s suffering and death, but today’s readings show us that the passion of Christ cannot be separated from His resurrection. This Sunday’s Gospel foreshadows both the resurrection and Christ’s second coming. We wait in hope for Christ to come again, knowing that God is faithful to His promises.
In both the New and Old Testaments, God communicates His presence through signs. The smoking fire pot that passes between Abram’s sacrifices represents God’s presence. Eight days after Jesus warned His friends that they would be required to take up their cross and follow Him, He retreated to the mountain to pray. As Saint Luke envisions this event, two powerful figures from salvation history appeared to converse with Jesus about the fate that awaited Him in Jerusalem. Moses and Elijah, one representing the law and the other the prophets … and both signified that Jesus had fulfilled all that God sent Him to accomplish. Then, in the presence of three disciples, Jesus was stunningly transfigured. They saw Him shining and beautiful in body and soul.
In the transfigured Lord, we see how suffering and joy are intertwined. We cannot be sure whether Saint Luke is reporting an historic event or creatively imagining a vision to verify Jesus’ divine identity. His picture of Jesus confiding in Moses and Elijah about the suffering He will soon undergo rings true despite the centuries separating these two prophets. In Moses’ time, he had fled in fear from Pharoah’s wrath. And Elijah had run for his life from the death threats of Queen Jezebel. Both had suffered and had their faith tested. Yet, through prayer, they came to know the joy of intimate union with God. Jesus will undergo His own Exodus … His Passion, His Death, His Resurrection, and His Ascension … from suffering and death to resurrection joy.
In the transfigured Lord, we find a remedy for fear and anxiety. Peter, James and John, the same three disciples who will accompany Jesus into the garden of Gethsemane, had fallen asleep while Jesus prayed on the mountain. They were not yet able to follow Him into deep communion with God. When an imposing cloud suddenly enveloped them, they trembled at the possibility that some evil might befall them. But a voice from the cloud assured them, “This is my chosen Son; listen to Him.” Although we cannot see Jesus in His risen glory, we can entrust ourselves – as did Immaculée Ilibagazia – to His care and make prayer our armor against all forms of darkness.
In the transfigured Lord, we can seek encounters with the divine. Jesus repeatedly sought the presence of His Father by retreating into the desert, sailing out on the sea of Galilee, or venturing up the mountain. There He could more readily enter the inner room of union with the God whose name is Love. We can do likewise by setting aside Lenten retreat times … quiet times for reflection and prayer that may include spending time at a lake or perhaps by the sea, or maybe in the park or perhaps on the trail, maybe in a garden or even at a monastery. God will not be sought in vain. Saint Augustine reminds us that people wonder at the beauty of mountains, the vastness of the sea, the movement of the stars “and yet they pass by themselves without wondering.”
In this holy season of Lent, we unite ourselves with the transfigured Lord in suffering and in joy. We make prayer our armor against the forces of darkness. And we seek Him in the beauty of creation, remembering that we too are “shining and beautiful in body and in soul.” By seeking Christ in the beauty of creation and in each other, we grow in union with God.
We are called to place our trust in God and persevere in faith. We need to remember that without the cross there can be no resurrection. In a few moments, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, will become present to us in a unique way, and yet His glory will be veiled under the appearances of bread and wine. It is not until Christ comes again that we will truly see Him as He is. We may experience hints of it now in our own “mountaintop” moments, but today’s readings remind us that we must persevere in faith like our father Abraham. With our eyes fixed on the Resurrection, we must endure both the crosses we choose, and the crosses chosen for us.
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