The Word Of Peace
Homiletic Reflections On Peacemaking

Deacon Robert M. Pallotti, D. Min.

Transfiguration of the Lord, Cycle B

August 6, 2000

Transfiguration of Life

His clothes and face became dazzling white! This story of the transfiguration is one of the most powerful of all the stories in the Scripture. The glory that was to be that of Jesus in the resurrection is made manifest to the Peter, James and John. Yet it is clear that they really don’t know how to react to this or what to really make of it. Jesus reminds them that the glory can only come through the cross. They still don’t really get it so Jesus tells them not to say a word to anyone. The reason: they cannot speak of his glory until they come to grips with the cross. That is, that transfiguration is the flip side of service love, love unto death.

All human beings are in the same situation. There are crosses and a cross out there that we must come to grips with. For some this is the cross of hopelessness or that no one really cares what happens to them. We could say that this is the state of our prison population in the United States. More people are in prison in the United States than are in Russia. For many people these folks are not worth the time of day to consider that maybe many of the prisoners can be redeemed, have their lives turned around.

In May of 1896, the English born social activist Maud Ballington Booth decided to spend her energies for the next 50 years on a ministry to convicts as a result of her experience of a visit to Sing Sing prison. Following the admonition of Jesus to visit those in prison, she also worked for prison reform. In the 1920’s she gave an address entitled "Beyond Hope".

When we look out over the lives of those whose souls have been soiled, whose talent and very manhood have been prostituted to evil, whose hopes and chances in life are blighted, we are prone to be hopeless concerning their future. If the shadow of prison walls is around then, and the stigma of detected crime has blackened their name and character, the world says of them, "That man is done for. He has thrown away his chances. He will never make anything of life after this." If he be one who has lived long in crime, who has been especially reckless, hardened, and desperate in character, one for whom on one has a good word and who has been but a denizen of the underworld, then the world will indeed say that the case is hopeless….

I believed when I first went to a prison, and I believe s hundredfold more intensely now, that in every human heart there is something to reach, and that there is an influence above that step in where human love and work and effort could not avail to bring about much-needed awakening and unfold a revelation of future possibility.

In a very real sense we are all prisoners to some degree in ourselves, in our limitations and our mortality. And yet God shows us something wonderful. But why does God do that? The transfiguration of Jesus is great for the Lord but what about us? Well, that’s what God is getting at. We are being told that Jesus is the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets. That all that humans have been promised by God is coming to completion in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Jesus’ glorification is a signpost that points to our future with God—a transfigured life. But what does this mean? And how do we get there?

This was on the mind of the apostles as well. Jesus tells them quite clearly, it is about the cross. Our lives can be transfigured through the acceptance of the cross, which is a powerful of way of saying, through a life of service love. But there is something more involved here. It is a matter of believing that God wants to transform our lives. It is about saying yes to God’s love that can change a hopeless situation into an opportunity! God gives us a glimpse of that possibility to help us to believe in possibility of new life and to encourage us to accept the cross of love that is the portal to that life.

Such a life is no longer concerned with the self-righteous and pitiless attitude that condemns others because they made mistakes in life. Such a life embraces the possibility that God’s power of unlimited love can transform the hopeless situation and save those others have consigned to damnation. For all of us it means that we are not hopeless cases even when we give up on ourselves. God has not given up on us, and transformation, transfiguration awaits us each moment. That is the revelation of God in Christ. That the judge that is the Son of Man does not give up on us. That this is a judge that died for us so that our lives and the life of the world could be transfigured. Today we are faced with the choice: hope or despair, hate or love, damnation or transfiguration. Such a choice will manifest itself in how our lives and the lives of others and this planet are affected.

Do we believe that all people can one day have enough food to eat? Can we believe that nations can solve their conflicts without war and threatening global extinction? Can we believe that even the most wretched of this world are created in God’s image and that their lives can be transfigured? Can we believe that our own person'’ are not beyond the pale of God'’ transforming love? If we can believe in the new then we have glimpsed the glory revealed on the mountain. We then will be a people of service love that brings hope to a sometimes-hopeless world--the promise of Transfiguration to a world that cannot imagine anything new. The power of the new life for all and a world beyond our dreams!

Deacon Robert M. Pallotti, D. Min.
Uploaded August 6, 2000