The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke all recount the episode of the Transfiguration of Jesus. There we see the Lord’s response to the failure of his disciples to understand him. Shortly before, there had been a real clash between the Master and Simon Peter, who after professing his faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God, rejected his prediction of the passion and the cross. Jesus had rebuked him firmly: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a scandal to me, because you do not think according to God, but according to men (Matthew 16:23)!” Six days later, “Jesus took with him Peter, James, and John his brother and led them away to a high mountain (Matthew 17:1).”

The Gospel of the Transfiguration is proclaimed every year on the Second Sunday of Lent. During this liturgical season, the Lord takes us with him to a place apart. While our ordinary commitments compel us to remain in our usual places and are often repetitive and sometimes boring, we are invited during Lent to ascend a “high mountain” in the company of Jesus and live a particular experience of spiritual discipline, an ascesis, as God’s holy people.

Lenten penance is a commitment, sustained by grace, to overcome our lack of faith and our resistance to following Jesus on the way of the cross. This is precisely what Peter and the other disciples needed to do. To deepen our knowledge of the Master, to fully understand and embrace the mystery of salvation, accomplished by total self-giving inspired by love, we must allow ourselves to be taken aside by the Lord and detach ourselves from vanity and mediocrity. We need to set out on the journey, an uphill path that like a mountain trek, requires effort, sacrifice, and concentration…

In his retreat on Mount Tabor, Jesus takes with him three disciples, chosen to be witnesses of a unique event. He wants this experience of grace to be shared, not solitary, just as our whole life of faith is an experience that is shared. For it is in togetherness that we follow Jesus. Together, too, as a pilgrim church in time, we experience the liturgical year and Lent within it, walking alongside those whom the Lord has placed among us as fellow travelers…

And so we come to its culmination. The Gospel relates that Jesus “was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light (Matthew 17:2).” This is the summit, the goal of the journey. At the end of their ascent, as they stand on the mountain heights with Jesus, the three disciples are given the grace of seeing him in glory, resplendent in supernatural light. That light did not come from without, but radiated from the Lord himself. The divine beauty of this vision was incomparably greater than all the efforts the disciples made in the ascent of Mount Tabor. During any strenuous mountain trek, we must keep our eyes firmly fixed on the path, and yet the panorama that opens up at the end amazes and rewards us with its grandeur…

Dear Brothers and sisters, may the Holy Spirit inspire and sustain us this Lent in our ascent with Jesus, so that we may experience his divine splendor and then, confirmed in faith, persevere in our journey together with him, glory of his people, and light of the nations.

Note: This essay is excerpted from the Holy Father’s Message for Lent 2023.

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