2nd Sunday of Lent
The technological advances of the last few decades have revealed to man the existence of formerly unsuspected realities. Today we know about certain light wavelengths, such as ultraviolet and infrared rays, which are hidden from the human eye but can have an intense and sometimes even harmful effect on our skin. Similarly, some sound frequencies can be picked up by certain living beings and not by others. This means, for example, that dogs hear sounds that are inaudible to us. These elements present us with a world that is inaccessible to our senses.
Now, if there are lights and sounds that we cannot perceive in the physical realm, what about those things “no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived” (1 Cor 2:9)?
However, that same technology which should help us understand, by analogy, the supernatural world, conditions us more and more every day to live apart from it, “enclosed” in a self-sufficient, independent and supposedly perfect material universe, which seeks to provide man with the complete satisfaction of his desires and needs; a universe – it could not be otherwise – that is closed to any transcendental influence and from which God is the great excluded one.
In the second reading, the Apostle denounces the mentality of those who live like this: “Their end is destruction, their god is the belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things” (Phil 3:19).
In the Gospel we find the account of the Transfiguration of the Lord (cf. Lk 9:28b-36). To those closest to Him, Jesus revealed Himself as God atop a mountain where He showed them the glory of His divinity, His kingship and His power. For what purpose? So that His disciples would not prevaricate in the face of the harshness of the Cross and would not be ashamed of Him when they saw Him suffer.1
The Divine Redeemer was really granting His Apostles an extraordinary grace: the elevation of their sights, through which they could be cured of the naturalism that blinded them and behold, in the words of St. Paul, “our commonwealth […] in Heaven” (Phil 3:20). If they were faithful to this gift, they would always live according to the vision of Mount Tabor, which would enable them to courageously endure the torments of the Passion.
We have never been so surrounded by uncertainty as we are today. Wars, epidemics and catastrophes point at every turn to the authenticity of Our Lady’s prophecies at Fatima. Meanwhile, the idyllic world fabricated by the propagandists of materialism threatens to collapse at any moment, abandoning its adherents to their fate.
At that hour, who will remain standing but those who truly believe “our commonwealth is in Heaven”, who look up to the Lord and therefore have courage (cf. Ps 26:4)? They know that the Creator of the universe has the power to subject all things to Himself (cf. Phil 3:21).
With those who live in this way, like the patriarch Abraham, God establishes an indissoluble covenant (cf. Gn 15:18) by which, even amidst the most terrible darkness of today’s panorama, they can proclaim: “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?’ (Ps 27:1). ◊
Notes
1 Cf. ST. LEO THE GREAT. Sermon 51, n.2: SC 74bis, 25.
