By Archbishop Thomas Wenski - The Archdiocese of Miami
Archbishop Thomas Wenski's homily at Mass with the Catholic Educators' Guild, where Jesuit Father Marcelino García was presented with the Lumen Christi award. St. Mary Cathedral, March 1, 2015.
Today, we welcome to the Cathedral the Archdiocese of Miami’s Catholic Educators’ Guild who honors today one of its own with the Lumen Christi award, Father Marcelino. Father Marcelino is a Jesuit priest and one of the charisms of the Society of Jesus has always been education and the formation of the young. The motto of St. Ignatius was Ad Maiorem Dei Gloria – “For the greater glory of God.” Education is important for worldly success during our life’s journey – a good education will hopefully help us do well; but a good Catholic education aided by faith, the Lumen Christi – the light of Christ – will also help us do good – and thus allow us as we journey through life to “give greater glory to God.”
In today’s Gospel reading for this Second Sunday of Lent we see that Jesus too is on a journey – a journey that will ultimately take him to Jerusalem and to his passion. However, he first stops to pray – and on Mount Tabor in the presence of three of his apostles, he is transfigured. The glory of his Divinity– normally hidden in his humanity – is briefly revealed. This transfiguration – this manifestation of Jesus in his glory – is a prelude to – but also an explanation of – what he was about to endure in Jerusalem when he resumes his journey. For Jesus will give greatest glory to God on the Cross.
As members of his Church, we are a pilgrim people. Our journey through life takes us along hills and valleys; that is, through high points and low points. Our Lenten observance – prayer, fasting, and almsgiving – is a way of checking our spiritual GPS – to make sure that with all the twists and turns of our life’s journey we are still going in the right direction. Lent reminds us that the true purpose of life is not to seek our glory but God’s glory and that is found not through self-assertion or self-seeking but self-giving and self-sacrificing.
Today, like Peter, James and John, we are invited to the hilltop of Mount Tabor. Indeed, each Sunday as a people of faith we go to the top of Mount Tabor in a figurative sense, for as people of faith we go every Sunday to Mass. Today’s Mass – indeed, every Mass – is a re-presentation of Calvary’s Sacrifice – but it is also a pledge of our future glory. In the Mass, God once again renews his Covenant of Love and his Promise to us that we will one day share in his Glory. And so, like Peter, we too can exclaim: it is good for us to be here. And we, though many, are made one Body in the Body of Christ we receive in Holy Communion and so are strengthened by Christ to continue with him on the journey of life whose final destination is the glory of heaven.
Yet, like Jesus and his three apostles, we cannot stay on the mountain top. Our life’s journey still awaits us: our prayer, our participation in the Mass and the sacraments are meant not as an escape from life with its daily challenges and disappointments but a means of assuring us that, as St. Paul says in the second reading from Romans, “if God is for us, who can be against us." We must go down with Jesus to the valley and continue our journey to Jerusalem. For the Road to Glory – for Jesus and for us – passes through the Way of the Cross.
