Memory of the Saints and the Prophets
Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord on Mount Tabor.
We remember Hiroshima in Japan, where the first atomic bomb was dropped in 1945.
Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You are a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people acquired by God
to proclaim his marvellous works.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Daniel 7,9-10.13-14
While I was watching, thrones were set in place and one most venerable took his seat. His robe was white as snow, the hair of his head as pure as wool. His throne was a blaze of flames, its wheels were a burning fire. A stream of fire poured out, issuing from his presence. A thousand thousand waited on him, ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him. The court was in session and the books lay open. I was gazing into the visions of the night, when I saw, coming on the clouds of heaven, as it were a son of man. He came to the One most venerable and was led into his presence. On him was conferred rule, honour and kingship, and all peoples, nations and languages became his servants. His rule is an everlasting rule which will never pass away, and his kingship will never come to an end.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The mountain of the Transfiguration, which later tradition identifies with Tabor, stands as the image of every spiritual journey. Jesus also calls us with him on the mountain, as he did with his three closest friends to live with him the experience of intimate communion with the Father. Some commentators suggest that the story tells of a spiritual experience that involved above all Jesus: a heavenly vision that produced a transfiguration in him. It is a hypothesis that allows us to grasp more deeply Jesus' spiritual life. Sometimes we forget that Jesus also had his spiritual journey, he too had to climb the mountain, as Abraham and Moses, Elijah did and as every believer must do. It is to say that Jesus too felt the need to "go up" to the Father, to meet with him after he had descended to dwell among us. It is true that the communion with the Father was his very being, his whole life, the bread of his days, the substance of its mission, the heart of all that he was and did; but he needed moments in which this intimate relationship emerged in its fullness. Certainly, the disciples needed it. The experience of Tabor was one of those singular moments of communion that the Gospel extends to all the historical events of the people of Israel, as evidenced by the presence of Moses and Elijah, who "were talking with Jesus." Jesus did not live this experience alone; he also involved his three closest friends. It was a moment among the most significant for Jesus' personal life, and it also became such for the three disciples and for all those who allow themselves to be involved in the same ascent. In the regular life with the Lord, in prayer and listening to the Scriptures we are always called to transfigure our life and the world around us.