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The Transfiguration
Both Roman and Eastern rite Catholics celebrate the
Church’s feast of the Transfiguration today, August 6, on its traditional date for both
calendars.
The feast commemorates one of the pinnacles of Jesus’ earthly life,
when he revealed his divinity to three of his closest disciples by means
of a miraculous and supernatural light.
Before his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Christ climbed to a high
point on Mount Tabor with his disciples Peter, James, and John. While
Jesus prayed upon the mountain, his appearance was changed by a
brilliant white light which shone from him and from his clothing.
During this event, the Old Testament figures of Moses and the prophet
Elijah also appeared, and spoke of how Christ would suffer and die
after entering Jerusalem, before his resurrection.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record that the voice of God was heard,
confirming Jesus as his son (Matthew 17:5, Mark 9:6, Luke 9:35). Peter
and John make specific reference to the event in their writings, as
confirming Jesus’ divinity and his status as the Messiah (2 Peter 1:17,
John 1:14).
In his address before the Angelus on August 6, 2006, Pope Benedict
XVI described how the events of the transfiguration display Christ as
the “full manifestation of God’s light.â�
This light, which shines forth from Christ both at the
transfiguration and after his resurrection, is ultimately triumphant
over “the power of the darkness of evil.â�
The Pope stressed that the feast of the Transfiguration is an
important opportunity for believers to look to Christ as “the light of
the world,â� and to experience the kind of conversion which the Bible
frequently describes as an emergence from darkness to light.
“In our time too,â� Pope Benedict said, “we urgently need to emerge
from the darkness of evil, to experience the joy of the children of
light!â�
For Eastern Catholics, the Feast of the Transfiguration is especially
significant. It is among the 12 “great feastsâ� of Eastern Catholicism,
and it is a Holy Day of Obligation on which Eastern Catholics are
obliged to attend the Divine Liturgy. The feast is not a day of
obligation for Catholics of the Roman rite.
Eastern Christianity emphasizes that Christ’s transfiguration is the
prototype of spiritual illumination, which is possible for the committed
disciple of Jesus. This Christian form of “enlightenmentâ� is
facilitated by the ascetic disciplines of prayer, fasting, and
charitable almsgiving.
A revered hierarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, the late
Archbishop Joseph Raya, described this traditional Byzantine view of the
transfiguration in his book of meditations on the Biblical event and
its liturgical celebration, titled “Transfiguration of Our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ.â�
“Transfiguration,â� Archbishop Raya wrote, “is not simply an event out
of the two-thousand-year old past, or a future yet to come. It is
rather a reality of the present, a way of life available to those who
seek and accept Christ’s nearness.â�
2012-08-06 00:26:34
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