Father Koch: The Transfiguration connects us all to the Covenant
February 23, 2024 at 9:00 a.m.
Gospel reflection for Feb. 25, 2024, Second Sunday of Lent
The First Reading poses a challenging dilemma as we ponder the very suggestion that Abraham would sacrifice Isaac to God.
Given the sensitive nature of the text some people get very unsettled. I had someone write to me a few years ago to complain about this being read at Mass and wanted it to be omitted in the future. Well, that is not happening, of course.
The Israelites at no time offered human sacrifice to God. There is no hint of such in the Old Testament, and the practice is roundly condemned by the Law and the Prophets in those areas where it occurred among their neighbors. It is true that some of the later kings, influenced by the cultic practices of the local tribes did offer their sons to the idol Moloch, such was an abomination, and those kings were brought to bitter ends.
This means that when God tested the faithfulness of Abraham by asking for Isaac as a sacrifice, he was obedient to this extreme request. It was never God’s intention to have Isaac sacrificed, so Abraham was spared the pain. Instead, God provided a ram to be sacrificed, thus setting the parameters for all future sacrifice in the Israelite economy of religion.
The sacrifice that God asks of us is not that of our own blood, but of the conversion of our minds and hearts expressed then as we offer alms for the poor and our worship of the Father.
Yet, in the Second Reading, Paul teaches that God sacrificed His Son, Jesus, on our behalf, and that it is through his Cross and Resurrection that we have been brought to God.
His was a willful self-offering to his Father. As at Mount Moriah the ram replaced the son, Isaac, on Mount Calvary the Lamb of God replaced the sacrifices made there for the expiation of sins and atonement for the transgressions of humankind.
There are those who look at that First Reading and immediately jump to a judgment about how God in the Old Testament seems to be vengeful and blood thirsty. The account directly rejects that notion. Certainly, in the Transfiguration we see revealed not a vengeful God, but a God who is Father to a Son, a loving Father, whose compassion extends from the Son to the entirety of humanity. The Transfiguration reveals as much about the Father as it does the Son.
The Father sends the Son into the world so that in the Son the Godhead -- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- will encounter and experience the human condition and specifically human suffering. While Jesus was not saved from the ordinary experiences of suffering throughout his life -- he had relatives who died, perhaps he moved from one home to another and had to give up friends, perhaps there were days when there wasn’t enough food to go around, and he experienced the usual struggles as all children do -- it is the greatest of all sufferings, his Crucifixion, that brings salvation and healing to a broken and fallen world.
In this way we encounter a God who as Father, loves not only his son, but loves and has mercy on all his children, the entire human race.
Tradition holds that the Transfiguration occurred 40 days before the Crucifixion. This stands, not only a revelation about Jesus to the disciples, but also as a moment of revelation to Jesus. Here with Moses and Elijah, Jesus is shown the fullness for which he longs, and sees the meaning of his own pending suffering and Death.
From the top of the Mountain of Transfiguration Jesus gets the perspective to see the whole picture. Peter and the other disciples likewise see the fullness of the covenant, from time past to the one that will be accomplished before their very eyes.
No point in the ministry of Jesus draws our focus as clearly to the fullness of the covenant as does the Transfiguration. The Eucharist, which is the food of the covenant, is also foreshadowed here through Moses and Elijah.
The Transfiguration simultaneously speaks of the present in the midst of the past, while pointing to the future.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.
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Gospel reflection for Feb. 25, 2024, Second Sunday of Lent
The First Reading poses a challenging dilemma as we ponder the very suggestion that Abraham would sacrifice Isaac to God.
Given the sensitive nature of the text some people get very unsettled. I had someone write to me a few years ago to complain about this being read at Mass and wanted it to be omitted in the future. Well, that is not happening, of course.
The Israelites at no time offered human sacrifice to God. There is no hint of such in the Old Testament, and the practice is roundly condemned by the Law and the Prophets in those areas where it occurred among their neighbors. It is true that some of the later kings, influenced by the cultic practices of the local tribes did offer their sons to the idol Moloch, such was an abomination, and those kings were brought to bitter ends.
This means that when God tested the faithfulness of Abraham by asking for Isaac as a sacrifice, he was obedient to this extreme request. It was never God’s intention to have Isaac sacrificed, so Abraham was spared the pain. Instead, God provided a ram to be sacrificed, thus setting the parameters for all future sacrifice in the Israelite economy of religion.
The sacrifice that God asks of us is not that of our own blood, but of the conversion of our minds and hearts expressed then as we offer alms for the poor and our worship of the Father.
Yet, in the Second Reading, Paul teaches that God sacrificed His Son, Jesus, on our behalf, and that it is through his Cross and Resurrection that we have been brought to God.
His was a willful self-offering to his Father. As at Mount Moriah the ram replaced the son, Isaac, on Mount Calvary the Lamb of God replaced the sacrifices made there for the expiation of sins and atonement for the transgressions of humankind.
There are those who look at that First Reading and immediately jump to a judgment about how God in the Old Testament seems to be vengeful and blood thirsty. The account directly rejects that notion. Certainly, in the Transfiguration we see revealed not a vengeful God, but a God who is Father to a Son, a loving Father, whose compassion extends from the Son to the entirety of humanity. The Transfiguration reveals as much about the Father as it does the Son.
The Father sends the Son into the world so that in the Son the Godhead -- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- will encounter and experience the human condition and specifically human suffering. While Jesus was not saved from the ordinary experiences of suffering throughout his life -- he had relatives who died, perhaps he moved from one home to another and had to give up friends, perhaps there were days when there wasn’t enough food to go around, and he experienced the usual struggles as all children do -- it is the greatest of all sufferings, his Crucifixion, that brings salvation and healing to a broken and fallen world.
In this way we encounter a God who as Father, loves not only his son, but loves and has mercy on all his children, the entire human race.
Tradition holds that the Transfiguration occurred 40 days before the Crucifixion. This stands, not only a revelation about Jesus to the disciples, but also as a moment of revelation to Jesus. Here with Moses and Elijah, Jesus is shown the fullness for which he longs, and sees the meaning of his own pending suffering and Death.
From the top of the Mountain of Transfiguration Jesus gets the perspective to see the whole picture. Peter and the other disciples likewise see the fullness of the covenant, from time past to the one that will be accomplished before their very eyes.
No point in the ministry of Jesus draws our focus as clearly to the fullness of the covenant as does the Transfiguration. The Eucharist, which is the food of the covenant, is also foreshadowed here through Moses and Elijah.
The Transfiguration simultaneously speaks of the present in the midst of the past, while pointing to the future.
Father Garry Koch is pastor of St. Benedict Parish, Holmdel.