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The transfiguration appears in all three synoptic
Gospels. There are some relatively minor
differences across the three accounts but the main personae and content are
consistent. Jesus’ transfiguration
points us towards, and draws us into, a mystery that is beyond the reach of
historical reconstruction, scientific explanation or geographic
specificity.
Make a composition of place and application of senses. Moses and Elijah, the Law and the Prophets,
are there with Jesus.
Where are you standing?
What do you see?
What do you feel?
As he became increasingly anxious Peter began to speak.
What do you fear?
What do you desire?
Despite
the popular fashion for apostle bashing in theology and other circles, none of
us would have responded any better. Most
likely, we would have acted worse. Perhaps
we would have pulled out the Ancient Near East
equivalent of a cell phone and snapped pictures to tweet to the rest of the
apostles. Or perhaps we would have
merely babbled incoherently. As the
tension of the scene increased the voice of God the Father confirmed that Jesus is who Peter had confessed him to
be earlier in the Gospel:
The Messiah.
The Anointed One.
The Christ.
Then
the apostles, and by extension each of us, were given a mission, "Listen
to him." How does that play out in
the context of today, a day on which we recall more than the Transfiguration?
Today we recall another event marked by blinding light. An event that was also overshadowed by a
cloud. Like the Transfiguration, it is a
scene that, if you are willing to place yourself into it, would cast you to the
ground in fear or awe.
Today we commemorate that Jesus revealed his Divinity on a
mountain. We also commemorate that on
this date in 1945 the human race revealed its depravity at Hiroshima. The world would never be the same. Hiroshima captured the sum total of the
depravity of the human race. Not the
depravity of a particular nation, or ethnic group, or epoch of history but the
sum total of human sinfulness. It took
the horrors of the wars of the past millennia and those of the millennia to
come, and condensed them into one singular event. This time God did not speak. There was a terrible silence. Or was there?
The voice of God was obscured by the explosion. It was not silenced. Today, almost 2000 years since Jesus death
and seventy years since the atomic bomb exploded in Hiroshima, the mandate,
“listen to him” is as compelling and urgent for us as it was for the shaken
apostles. Perhaps it is more compelling because
Hiroshima demonstrated humankind's capacity for instantaneous large-scale
destruction. A capacity that is unique
to the present.
LISTEN to him.
Listen to HIM.
As
we listen to Jesus, if we allow Him to transform us through prayer, through
reading and meditating on scripture, and, most particularly, through regular
participation in the Eucharist, we move that much closer to the eschatological
glory foreshadowed in the transfigured Jesus.
And that much farther from the apocalyptic destruction of Hiroshima.
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Today's photos, except for one, are a little odd.
The non-odd one is some flowers in the sun. I liked the backlight
This is the Leaning Dome of Weston. This effect came from taking the photo of Campion Center as reflected in a car window.
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