As we persevere in our Lenten observance, a week in now, we hope to carry through until the sixth week, and this weekend we have in our readings two episodes that take place on high mountains. Ascending towards a sanctuary was very significant in both the old and the new testaments. A sanctuary has nothing to do with the place itself, but rather with what or Who the place contains. The Temple is holy because God dwells within in some way. The tabernacle is holy because God dwells within it inexplicably. Every one of us Christians is holy because the Holy Spirit dwells within us somehow. In the first reading, Abraham ascends Mount Moriah, which is later called Mount Sion, the place where David plans and Solomon builds the Temple in Jerusalem. Already, in expectation of that later glory, the mountain is holy, but it is also at this moment holy because God is there. And what an extraordinary thing that the God of love requests of this poor man.
“After this, God would put Abraham to the test. So He called to him, ‘Abraham, Abraham;’ and when he said, ‘I am here, at Thy command,’ God told him, ‘Take thy only son, thy beloved son Isaac, with thee, to the land of Clear Vision, and there offer him to Me in burnt-sacrifice on a mountain which I will shew thee.’ Rising, therefore, at dawn, Abraham saddled his ass, bidding two of the men-servants and his son Isaac follow him; he cut the wood needed for the burnt-sacrifice, and then set out for the place of which God had spoken to him. It was two days later when he looked up and saw it, still far off; and now he said to his servants, ‘Wait here with the ass, while I and my son make our way yonder; we will come back to you, when we have offered worship there.’ Then he took the wood for the sacrifice, and gave it to his son Isaac to carry; he himself carried the brazier and the knife. As they walked along together Isaac said to him, ‘Father.’ ‘What is it, my son?’ he asked. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘we have the fire here and the wood; where is the lamb we need for a victim?’ ‘My son,’ said Abraham, ‘God will see to it that there is a lamb to be sacrificed.’ So they went on together till they reached the place God had shewn him. And here he built an altar, and set the wood in order on it; then he bound his son Isaac and laid him down there on the altar, above the pile of wood. And he reached out, and took up the knife, to slay his son. But now, from heaven, an angel of the Lord called to him, ‘Abraham, Abraham.’ And when he answered, ‘Here am I, at Thy command,’ the angel said, ‘Do the lad no hurt, let him alone. I know now that thou fearest God; for My sake thou wast ready to give up thy only son.’ And Abraham, looking about him, saw behind him a ram caught by the horns in a thicket; this he took, and offered it as a burnt-sacrifice, instead of his son. So Abraham called that spot, The Lord’s Foresight; and the saying goes to this day, ‘On the mountain top, the Lord will see to it.’ Once more the angel of the Lord called to Abraham out of heaven; and he said, ‘This message the Lord has for thee: I have taken an oath by My own Name to reward thee for this act of thine, when thou wast ready to give up thy only son for My sake. More and more will I bless thee, more and more will I give increase to thy posterity, till they are countless as the stars in heaven, or the sand by the sea shore; thy children shall storm the gates of their enemies; all the races of the world shall find a blessing through thy posterity, for this readiness of thine to do My bidding.'”
Book of Genesis, 22: 1-18 [link]
At the age of 100, and his wife being about 90, Abraham had received the joy of his son Isaac. That was certainly a miracle indeed, but the Holy One now asked for the life of the boy, and Abraham was not one who said No to God. Theologians see in this almost-sacrifice of the dearly beloved son a comparison to the later sacrifice of Christ, when the Holy One Himself gave up His dearly beloved Son to death. We can say in retrospect that God Who raised Christ from the dead could just as easily have raised Isaac up again. And I would suggest that that is just what Abraham must have expected also. When you’re hundred and your wife gives birth after a life of barrenness, you start to believe that anything is possible perhaps. So, what is this test the old man is put through? A test of faith in God? Yes! But there’s a little bit more to it. Abraham received a theology of sacrifice. Later on in the history of the people, under Moses, God would declare that the firstborn son, who opens the mother’s womb belongs to God Himself, and has to be bought back ritually by the parents by a Temple sacrifice. All of this is to teach us a lesson. Sacrifice to God must hurt us, must deprive us. We don’t give God any old thing, we give Him the best we can give, and even our own lives, our own hearts. Charity is not just giving away any money and property that we can spare, but giving of ourselves, creating to an extent a lack for ourselves. And because you have done this, He will say as He did to Abraham, now shall I bless you. This is why the Church invites us to not only fast and abstain, but to give the money we shall have saved away in alms or charity. Deprive yourself and give to others.
“Six days afterwards, Jesus took Peter and James and John with Him, and led them up to a high mountain where they were alone by themselves; and He was transfigured in their presence. His garments became bright, dazzling white like snow, white as no fuller here on earth could have made them. And they had sight of Elias, with Moses; these two were conversing with Jesus. Then Peter said aloud to Jesus, ‘Master, it is well that we should be here; let us make three arbours, one for Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias;’ he did not know what to say, for they were overcome with fear. And a cloud formed, overshadowing them; and from the cloud came a Voice, which said, ‘This is My beloved Son; to Him, then, listen.’ Then, on a sudden, they looked round them, and saw no one any more, but Jesus only with them. And as they were coming down from the mountain, He warned them not to tell anyone what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead; so they kept the matter to themselves, wondering what the words could mean, When He has risen from the dead.”
Gospel of S. Mark, 9: 1-9 [link]
The story of the Transfiguration takes place not long before the Passion and Death of Christ, and the act was surely at least in part a means of building up those three Apostles so that they (and the others) would be able to survive the tragedy of the suffering and death of their Master, and the apparent end of His mission. In the Transfiguration, God holds our Lord in His humanity up and says through the three Apostles to the Church, ‘Behold, here is My Isaac, listen to Him.’
What are we to do with that? We must take Christ up as our Way to God, we follow that way, He is the only Way. Like a lamb He was led to slaughter, and as we make a sacrifice to God of our own lives as Christians, we must be prepared to give up everything, a few small things for Lent, then greater things like our health and, finally, our property and our very lives. And we shall be fortified in all of this, as were the Apostles by the vision on the mountain. As S. Paul says in the second reading, now that God has given us His own Son in sacrifice, He cannot refuse us any gift. And so we shall ply Him with requests for His grace, that He may forgive us our many, many sins; that He may draw us ever near to Him; that He may build us up and prepare us to sacrifice even our lives for Him.
“When that is said, what follows? Who can be our adversary, if God is on our side?He did not even spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all; and must not that gift be accompanied by the gift of all else? Who will come forward to accuse God’s elect, when God acquits us? Who will pass sentence against us, when Jesus Christ, Who died, nay, has risen again, and sits at the right hand of God, is pleading for us? Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will affliction, or distress, or persecution, or hunger, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? ‘For thy sake,’ says the scripture, ‘we face death at every moment, reckoned no better than sheep marked down for slaughter.’ Yet in all this we are conquerors, through Him Who has granted us His love.”
Letter of S. Paul to the Romans, 8: 31-37
Catholic Louth and Mablethorpe 