Today the Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord. Jesus ascends Mount Tabor with Peter, James, and John, “[A]nd he was transfigured befor them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light….[A]bright cloud cast a shadow over them, then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”
An experience like this is not like watching a movie. It is not something you see and then walk away from, saying, “That was nice.” Rather, it is an intimate encounter that invites our transformation. The Magnificat introduction to the mass of the day calls Christ’s radiance at the Transfiguration “a kind of mirror in which we glimpse the glory that God wills to give his friends. The resplendence of the Transfiguration reveals the fullness of life destined to be ours. The Transfiguration invites us to configuration. As we peer into the glory that pours from every pore of the transfigured Christ, we cast off everything unworthy of our personal relationship with the Infinite, and we take on the luster of the Son of God….Silently, from Tabor’s splendor, the Savior begs: “Become what you behold.”
Become what you behold. The invitation is there. It is ours to accept.
Creo en Dios! 