VATICAN CITY (Catholic Online) - Once again we are pleased to offer the letter sent from the vatican Congregation for the Clergy to Priests throughout the world on this Second Sunday of Lent:

*****

From the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy:

The experience of the Transfiguration is an anticipation of the Pascal Mystery and the experience of the fulfilment that, related to Christ, we are all called to live. 

In the Messiah, the whole historic event of God with men, which passed through Israel's predilection, is condensed and renewed.  Moses and Elijah, the Law and the Prophets, or to express it clearly, all of the Old Covenant, is embraced, assumed and fulfilled in the Incarnation that extends out towards the death and Resurrection of Christ. 

The promise made to Abraham is accomplished.  The 'land' that the Father indicates to us is Christ Himself, who comes to meet us, and it is towards Him that we are called to go.  We are called!  The followers of Christ receive a call, just like the experience of the Transfiguration which brought with it a profound sense of human fulfilment, 'it is good that we are here' (Mt 17:4).

The followers of Christ and the road on which they travel coincide in the Same Person: Christ.  In fact, through the Transfiguration, everything in the lives of the Apostles and in the fulfilment of the history of the People of Israel, indicates the Lord. 

The Apostles personal existence and that of the whole universe, the Law and the Prophets, which they have obediently listened to since their youth, now indicates the Maestro. Their humanity, through the words of Peter, bursts fourth in recognition of a profound joy, as God the Father has given them, on the top of that mountain, the New Law of His Son, the Beloved.

From the Gospels we know that this is the last manifestation of Christ's divinity during His life on earth.  To underline this, the Evangelist tells us that, at the end of this extraordinary theopany, the Apostles 'raised their eyes, and saw no one else but Jesus' (Mt 17:8).  They saw 'only' His Sacred Humanity that would, a short while later, be transfigured in incarnated and crucified love.

We also follow the Humanity of Christ, knowing that He gives us in the present all the necessary instruments to know and follow Him.  He has inserted us into His Church, the human company that, regenerated by the Holy Spirit, prolongs the presence of the Risen One in history. 

He has given us Peter and the other Apostles, sacramentally rooted in a living relationship with the Lord, and through which He Himself is offered to us not only through His teaching, but above all else, in the Eucharistic celebration.  Christ also gave us the splendid Motherhood of Holy Mary, who reflects in a perfect way, the light of Christ's Resurrection.

In time, following the Lord faithfully and humbly we will also be allowed to see, in our own lives, that progressive and profound event, that transfiguration which is called holiness.

Gn 12,1-4: http://www.clerus.org/bibliaclerusonline/en/9absaul.htm
2Tm 1,8b-10: http://www.clerus.org/bibliaclerusonline/en/9an3hpa.htm
Mt 17,1-9: http://www.clerus.org/bibliaclerusonline/en/9abta1q.htm