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WORD FOR MISSION Every week CIAM offers
to lay, religious people and priests an itinerary of reflections on the
Sunday Liturgy in a missionary prespective. These are elements for a
missionary meditation, individual or in community, on the Word of God ,
which constantly and surprisingly continues to enlighten, strengthen
and sustain the missionary journey of the Church, for the life of the
World
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Transfigured Face -- disfigured faces
II Sunday
of Lent Genesis 15:5-12.17-18 Psalm 26 Philippians 3:17-4,1 Luke 9:28-36 Reflections To contemplate His face! The alternative Entrance Antiphon today gives us a key to the reading of the Gospel of the Transfiguation and the other Bible and liturgical texts in today's Mass. The antiphon says: ... to seek your face; I seek it, Lord! Do not hide from me! An answer to this insistent appeal comes f rom the mountain, where Jesus is transfigured in the presence of three chosen disciples: "the aspect of his face was changed, and his clothing becaame brilliant as lightning" (v.29). The evangelists dwell on the shining splendour that is the exterior sign of the identity of Jesus; indeed, light is the mark of God's world, of joy and festivity. Here the light is not from outside, but shines forth from the Person of Christ. Luke is careful to point out that "Jesus went up the mountain to pray, and while He was praying, his face was changed..." It is from the relationship with the Father that Jesus is dynamically transformed: his total identification with the Father shines in his face. The path of interior transformation is the same for the apostle as it was for Jesus: prayer which is a listening to and dialoguing with God in faith and in humble abandonment to Him, has the power to transform the life of a Christian and a missionary. Indeed, contemplation, prayer is the experience that founds mission. This was definitely the experience of Peter, who is clear that he was not "repeating cleverly invented myths", since there were three eye-witnesses, "when we were with him on the holy mountain". (2Pt.1:16.18). In his confusion and fear (v.33-34), Peter would have wished to avoid the mysteriouis exodus - the strange passing that would be completed in Jerusalem, about which Moses and Elijah spoke to Jesus (v.31). He would have liked to fix in time that splendid vision of the Kingdom (v.33), making it a perpetual "feast of tabernacles" tempo quella stupenda visione del Regno (v. 33) come una perenne "festa delle capanne" (Zc.14:16-18). Later, having overcome the crisis of the days of the Passion, Peter and his companions found that the experience of intimacy with the Teacher and of listening to Chosen One of the Father (v.35) took pre-eminence. Thus the postles were confirmed, empowered in their vocation and their commitment to the courageous proclamation of the Truth, right up to Martyrdom. "Listen to him!" said the voice from the cloud (v.36). Pope Benedict XVI notes clearly how pressing this command is today. (*) Peter had to leave the world of his purely human mental processes and enter into God's way of thinking (Mt.16:23). The same happened to Abraham (1st Reading). In each yearly cycle, the second Sunday in Lent presents an emblematic episode in Abranahm's life (the call, the 'sacrifice' of Isaac, the Covenant). God promises territory and descendants to Abraham, an old man with no land and no children; but in return He asks for for the total commitment of his heart, and faithfulness to the Covenant (v.18). Abraham comes to understand that to believe is not a casual action, but entails moving the centre of one's life and basing it totally on God. Through Faith, as St. Paul explains in the second Reading, we have the power to remain faithful in the Lord (4:1) even in times of trial, not behaving like the "enemies of the cross of Christ" (v.18) but as friends who wait for his coming "as saviour" (v. 20). The transfigured, fascinating face of Jesus foreshadows what he will be, really and definitively, after Easter. The same promise that is in us! The true dignity and worth of every single human person, which should never be defaced for any reason, is based firmly on this call to life and to glory. As we know only too well, the Face of Jesus is disfigured in the faces of many human persons, all over the world. At their meeting in Puebla (Mexico) in 1979, the Bishops of Latin America declared: "This situation of extreme and widespread poverty takes on, in real life, very concrete features, in which we must recognise the face of the suffering Christ, of the Lord who calls upon us and challenges us" (n.31). They continued with a whole list of disfigurations: the faces of sick, abandoned and exploited children; the faces of confused and exploited youth; the faces of indios and afro-americans who are forced to the edges of society; the faces of rural workers who are both exploited and neglected; faces of workers who are unemployed, and when they get a job, are made to work long hours for little pay, and easily sacked; the faces of old people who live on the edge of both family and civil society (cf. Puebla 32-43) The list could go on, with the additions that each of us could make, looking around our own country and society. Each issue is a compelling call to the consciences of those in power in the various nations, and of the missionaries of the Gospel of Jesus.
The Pope's words * "This is the gift and duty for each one of us during the season of Lent: to listen to Christ, like Mary. To listen to him in his Word, contained in Sacred Scripture. To listen to him in the events of our lives, seeking to decipher in them the messages of Providence. Finally, to listen to him in our brothers and sisters, especially in the lowly and the poor, to whom Jesus himself demands our concrete love. To listen to Christ and obey his voice: this is the principle way, the only way, that leads to the fullness of joy and of love". Benedict XVI Angelus of the 2nd. Sunday in Lent (12.03.2006)
In the steps of Missionaries - 6/3: St. Ollegario of Tarragona (Spain, 1137), Bishop of Barcellona, and also of Tarragona from the time this ancine See was freed from the dominion of the Moors. - 7/3: Sts. Perpetua and Felicity, martyred in Cartagine (+203), in the reign of the Emperoro Septimus Severus. - 8/3: St. John of God (1495-1550), a Portuguese religious, Founder of the Order of Brothers Hospitallers of St John of God. He is the Patron Saint of hospitals, of the sick and of nursing staff. - 8/3: Womens'World Day of Prayer (instituted in 1910, it became a United Nations Day in 1975). - 9/3: The Forty Martyrs of Cappadocia, who died at Sebaste (Armenia) in 320 AD. - 9/3: St Dominic Savio, who died aged 14 in 1857. He was educated by St. John Bosco. - 10/3: Bl. Elia del Soccorso Nieves del Castillo, a Mexican Augustinian priest, who was martyred at Cortázar (Mexico) along with others in 1928, during the persecution by the Government.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Compiled by Fr. Romeo Ballan, mcci - former Director of CIAM, Rome Translated by Fr. J.M. Troy, mccj Website: www.ciam.org “The Word for Mission” ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ |
