OMELIE / Omelie EN

28 feb 2021

28/02/2021 – 2nd Sunday of Lent  - B

28/02/2021 – 2^nd Sunday of Lent  - B

Reading 1 GEN 22,1-2.9°-10-13.15-18 Psalm 115/116 Reading 2 ROM 8,31b.34 Gospel  MK 9,2-10

This time too Jesus recommends His disciples not to say anything to anyone: the experience which left them dumbstruck because of its beauty and because of its anticipation of sufferings needs to remain hidden in their heart. They have seen Jesus praying: on His face and on His whole body appeared God’s light. When a man is praying he is not alone, in fact He is having a conversation with God: on him, therefore, is reflected and bestowed from above the Father’s grace and peace: even more so if the one who is praying is the Son of God Himself!

In God’s light also His saints have their place, above all around the one who has been announced as the one who needs to come, the beloved Son of the Father. Moses and Elijah represent all the just, all the patriarchs and the prophets, all those who in different ways have made shine, with love and steadfast faith, the authority and the wisdom of God on earth, among His people. Moses and Elijah in this moment live their best and most awaited moment, even more, this is the time in which the prophecy of their life is being fulfilled. Moses and Elijah are talking to Jesus: which could possibly be the topic of their conversation? Both of them have suffered a lot in order to finish their mission. Certainly Jesus is discussing with them what He is going to say to the three disciples when they will leave the mountain, so about His goal, about the final mystery of His obedience to the Father, who has shined on Him and has introduced Him with those few, very significant, words! “This is my Son”, words which in the second psalm are referring to the king who is going to be entrusted with the power over all peoples. “The beloved”: this is how Abraham will address his son Isaac while he is accompanying him to climb the mountain where he thinks he needs to sacrifice him. The first reading has brought us back on that mountain and has made us look at the highest moment of Abraham’s faith. “Listen to Him”: the whole Scripture is interlocked with the invitation to listen to God’s voice, and now He Himself says that the right way to do it is listening to the Son who has gone on the mountain to pray. Every word is a fulfilled prophecy, but also just a prophecy, so Word of God, which lets you see and helps you understand the following events involving exactly that Son who has taken a few steps back to pray with some of His first disciples.

The reaction of these three disciples seems quite superficial. At the beginning fear has left them aghast, all three of them. Then Peter stops to consider only the enjoyment of the moment, and he desires to make it last, in order for  its sweet and sensational emotion to last. It is true that being with Jesus you can experience good emotions, you have pleasant experiences. However, our attention cannot linger on these, but it should be concentrating on Him, on Jesus, even at the cost of not ever being able to experience again the same thing. Living with Him, we too will climb the mountain with Abraham, we will live the effort of Moses and the desolation experienced by Elijah, with him we will cry, and we will walk with doubt in the heart, abandoned to the certain, but unknown possibility of the Lord’s intervention.

Living with Jesus we will be strengthened, like Saint Paul, in the certainty that we are loved by the Father, to be safe, to be at the centre of God’s heart even when our enemy is making us walk the path of death. Our heart will become a chest which hides precious treasures, as the three disciples' heart, who were able to keep the experience for themselves, making it the subject of continuous, humble, meditation.

When you cannot understand some word or some mystery of God, this is the way you should follow: with humility you should keep it in your heart until the Lord Himself will think becoming to reveal it to us. When we will renew the promises of our baptism during the Easter Vigil Mass, this humility will be the gift the Father will like, which will strengthen us in our faith and charity. This is what will do the three who hear from Jesus' mouth, their master, the word resurrection. A new word, too mysterious. They will keep it in the silence of their heart with humility. They will understand that living with Jesus it is like taking part in a mystery, which only with humility can be approached.