Sunday, February 28, 2021

 THE SECOND SUNDAY OF LENT

(Genesis 22: 1-2.9-13.15-18; Romans 8: 31-34; Mark 9: 2-10)

The woman was commenting on the Lord's Prayer. She said that she was willing to accept all that is God's will. But she - she added - "may God not have something bad happen to my children." Abraham certainly has the same attitude in the first reading. The last thing he wants is for something bad to happen to his son Isaac.

The Jews call this passage in Genesis "the binding of Isaac." They say that the story is the most powerful in the book. God really asks Abraham to kill his own son! The text adds that the petition is a test. But it does not specify the purpose of such a morbid test. It seems exaggerated, inconceivable of God. Anyway, Abraham passes the test. He shows that he is willing to sacrifice even his own son his if God asks.

We Christians have another way to understand this story. It is not so much a test of Abraham but a parable expressing the love of God. As much as he asks Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice, God has offered his own son to the world. However, where God is good and does not allow Abraham to kill his son, the world is cruel. It will kill Jesus for interfering with the established order of religion. The gospel gives us a glimpse of God's offering to the world.

Jesus has gone up the mountain with three disciples. There he is transfigured so that all three see his divinity. One commenter says it is not so much a transfiguration as a show of transparency. The three companions see the depths of Jesus for the first time and perceive his divinity. The clothes of Jesus turning "splendidly white" testify to this fact.  They become like the dress of the Ancient of Days sitting on his throne in the book of the prophet Daniel (Daniel 7:9).

The disciples will need this vision of glory during the ordeal to come. They will see Jesus captured, tried, and executed as an insurgent. Now they have been assured for the future that he is not a false hero but the true Son of God. We need this vision for another reason.

We live in increasingly anti-Christian times. Many if they are not afraid at least they do not want to publicly acknowledge their faith in God. We will not be pursued for going to Mass on Sunday. But living our faith the other six days of the week may cause us problems. Recently Twitter “froze” the account of a Catholic news service. The "offense" evidently was that the new service reported for its readers the news that President Biden appointed a biological man who identifies himself as a transgender woman to a high office in the Department of Health. Twitter said that posting the matter constituted "hateful conduct." Probably because of the clamor it created, the freeze didn't last long. Still we wonder why Twitter judges the publication of the report as "hateful." Isn't it alarming news when a high official thinks he can change his gender? Certainly this official, like everyone else, deserves respect as a human person. But we should be concerned when a person who challenges the nature of his own body occupies a position where he can influence many others to do the same.

In the passage God has a message for both us and the disciples. He says that Jesus “is my beloved Son; listen to him.” Jesus commands us to proclaim from the rooftops what he tells us in private. First and foremost, his message is always God's love for everyone. As Saint Paul says in the second reading, God "is" ready to give us everything, together with his Son. Second, Jesus instructs us how to respond to this love by not satisfying our cravings but by giving ourselves to others in love.

From the beginning the challenge for Christians has been how to be in the world without being of the world. We can express this challenge in another way: how can we love the world without being corrupted by the world? As the smartest kids in religion classes know, the answer is usually "Jesus." We have to reflect on the ways of Jesus so that we might put them into practice daily.