The Transfiguration and Man's Divinization - Talk for the Image of God Institute Benefit Dinner

 Good evening.

 We have many things to celebrate this evening. The first is the great feast day of our Lord Jesus’ Transfiguration. The second is the great work to which Michael and Heather Vento have dedicated themselves in founding the Image of God Institute. Wonderfully, this Institute and the Transfiguration go hand in hand – the Transfiguration, in fact, reveals the goal of the Image of God Institute. I will circle back to that in a bit.

 In the days before His crucifixion, Jesus took three of his disciples – Peter, James, and John – up Mount Tabor.There, Jesus showed Himself the source and the summit from which all humanity comes and for which we are all made. On that height, Jesus revealed the glory of His Divinity; He who is the “Light of the World” revealed the splendor of His light. For Catholics, an equivalent to this moment would be if light suddenly shined from the Eucharistic host (I would be rendered mute if this took place as I held Jesus in my very hands at the altar). This did once happen when St. Clare of Assisi raised the monstrance to defend herself and her sisters from ruthless barbarians, but I digress.

 What is tremendous in that moment of the Transfiguration of our Lord on Mount Tabor is that Jesus does not shrug off his human flesh in order to show his divinity. Rather, His divinity shines through his humanity. Even his clothes become dazzling white. In this, we see that He comes not only to redeem us, but to sanctify us and glorify us (“glory” being the “stuff” of God – that is the very technical, philosophical term: stuff)

 But, even more, Jesus comes to divinize us, just as Saint Peter, in Sacred Scripture, tells us: 

[Jesus’] divine power has bestowed on us everything … called us by his own glory and power. … so that through them you may become partakers in the divine nature … (2 Peter 1:4)

 “Partakers in the divine nature” – what does this even mean? How can we explain this? Saint Paul makes an attempt in his Second Letter to the Corinthians when compares the glory of Moses’ face with that of Jesus: 

[I]f the [Old Covenant] carved in letters on stone, was so glorious that the Israelites could not look intently at the face of Moses because of its glory that was going to fade, how much more will the ministry of the Spirit be glorious? … we, with our unveiled faces reflecting like mirrors the brightness of the Lord, all grow brighter and brighter [NAB: from glory to glory] as we are turned into the image that we reflect [that is, the image of God] …(2 Cor 3:7-8, 18)  

 Let me ask you a question: whose faces were glowing? Yes, it was Moses’. But Paul also says we will reflect the glory of the Lord. That “reflection” is not from a mere external rebounding of light, like the moon of the sun. No, the reflection will come from the Light Himself and from the transformation He accomplishes from within us – from our being divinized.

 Yes, Jesus not only wants a relationship with us; He wants to unite us to the deepest essence of His being.

 If this is the first time you are hearing this, it probably seems too much to fathom. And perhaps this is precisely the hole that the Image of God Institute rightly exists to fill.

 Let’s put this first part of the talk plainly, then. In the Transfiguration, we start to see clearly the reality (using the words of Saint Athanasius) that “God became man so that men might become gods.” How refreshing! Becoming a “nice person”—as nice as that is—is not the apex of the Gospel.

 Notice too how this refreshes what we say about the Eucharist, about how we eat the Lord’s “body, blood, soul, and … divinity.” How can we eat His divinity – and for what purpose other than to become Him? … You are—you become—what you eat! Your body and blood become one (in communion) with His body and blood. So … your soul and humanity… with his soul and … divinity. Yes, you become one. And not with His dead body, but with His resurrected, glorified body. This is a great mystery…

 And for men, for humanity, this divinization is impossible, but for God all things are possible.

 This is pure gift; it is the deepest grace.

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 One may ask: in addition to the Sacraments, how does God start to divinize us – or is it simply accomplished in the end?

 Pope Saint John Paul II, who is an important patron of the Image of God Institute, took up this very theme in his Encyclical Letter Veritatis Splendor (which is translated, the splendor of truth or the radiance of the Truth). In that letter, the Pope made many insightful connections.

 First, he says, 

Truth enlightens man's intelligence and shapes his freedom, leading him to know and love the Lord. Hence the Psalmist prays: "Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord" (Ps 4:6).

 Notice the connection between Truth and Freedom and the light of Jesus’ face. Jesus, who promised us the Spirit of Truth, and that the Truth would set us free, is Himself the “true light that enlightens everyone (John 1:9).

 So, returning to the Transfiguration, we see that not only is Jesus’ humanity radiant, but it is Truth itself that shines. The Truth has a radiant splendor. And so, when we are in communion with the Truth, we too start to shine. We have seen in this in the faces of the innocent and the aged wise…

 Pope Saint John Paul II wanted us to rediscover the glory of the Truth when he promulgated Veritatis Splendor on this very feast day—the Transfiguration—nearly 30 years ago. That was not accidental. Popes like to promulgate letters of the feast days that highlight the letter’s essence. Here, Pope Saint John Paul II wanted us to grasp that the Truth is the Light in the Darkness (“the people in darkness have seen a great light”). Jesus is the Truth and His Light reveals who we are and who we are to become.

 In that same letter, however, in the opening paragraphs in fact, Pope Saint John Paul II highlights the problems facing the Church and her embrace of the Light of Christ.

 As I quote this at length, please remember that this was written nearly 30 years ago. 

Today …  it seems necessary to reflect on the whole of the Church's moral teaching, with the precise goal of recalling certain fundamental truths of Catholic doctrine which, in the present circumstances, risk being distorted or denied. In fact, a new situation has come about within the Christian community itself, which has experienced the spread of numerous doubts and objections of a human and psychological, social and cultural, religious and even properly theological nature, with regard to the Church's moral teachings. 

[off the cuff: doubts, for example, concerning what is male and what is female…]

 It is no longer a matter of limited and occasional dissent, but of an overall and systematic calling into question of traditional moral doctrine, on the basis of certain anthropological and ethical presuppositions. 

[so, this isn’t a thing just on the margins anymore; it is a widespread thing; he said that thirty years ago]

 At the root of these presuppositions is the more or less obvious influence of currents of thought which end by detaching human freedom from its essential and constitutive relationship to truth. Thus the traditional doctrine regarding the natural law, and the universality and the permanent validity of its precepts, is rejected; certain of the Church's moral teachings are found simply unacceptable; and the Magisterium itself is considered capable of intervening in matters of morality only in order to "exhort consciences" and to "propose values", in the light of which each individual will independently make his or her decisions and life choices. … as if membership in the Church and her internal unity were to be decided on the basis of faith alone, while in the sphere of morality a pluralism of opinions and of kinds of behaviour could be tolerated… 

[off the cuff: so, he is saying that the perception is that the Church really can’t speak authoritatively on these matters; she just wrings her hands; and, in the end Catholics think that “being Catholic” is a subjective matter which doesn’t actually mean conforming oneself with the perennial teachings of Jesus and His Church. Sound familiar?]

 In particular, the question is asked: do the commandments of God, which are written on the human heart and are part of the Covenant, really have the capacity to clarify the daily decisions of individuals and entire societies? Is it possible to obey God and thus love God and neighbour, without respecting these commandments in all circumstances?. (VS, 4)

 He spends the rest of the encyclical addressing these matters. To all of this, I just with to say: thanks be to God that we have the Image of God Institute that is attempting to address these problems through study of the Theology of the body and other of the saintly pontiff’s writings!

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 Finally, let’s turn to the other patron of the Institute, Pope Benedict XVI, who was also a close friend of Pope Saint John Paul II and who helped write some of his encyclicals. Pope Benedict built on his predecessor’s foundation when he wrote the encyclical letter Caritas in Veritate – Charity in Truth. It is worth quoting the opening few sentences: 

Charity in truth, to which Jesus Christ bore witness by his earthly life and especially by his death and resurrection, is the principal driving force behind the authentic development of every person and of all humanity. Love — caritas — is an extraordinary force …. It is a force that has its origin in God, Eternal Love and Absolute Truth. The search for love and truth is purified and liberated by Jesus Christ from the impoverishment that our humanity brings to it, and he reveals to us in all its fullness the initiative of love and the plan for true life that God has prepared for us. In Christ, charity in truth becomes the Face of his Person. (CinV, 1) 

“The plan for true life…” What is the plan for true life? That God should become man so that we may become gods. And what does it mean to become gods? That we should live as they do; that we should love as they love. 

In the person of Jesus Christ, Truth and Love meet. In the Transfiguration, not only does Truth shine, but so does Love. Together, they are radiant. And they shine not simply in His divinity, but also through the Body, our humanity. 

For true, authentic human development – growth in holiness, divinization – we must embrace the Truth of Love, not as something amorphous or as needing some subjective rendering, but as it is: as having definition as the Body of Jesus has, as united to the Divine, flowing from Him, who Himself loves to the end. In a word, we must conform ourselves to Him.

 Conformity and obedience are bad words in the modern world – but what the modern world does not understand is that it conforms itself to things and fads all the time! How many are blindly obedient to group think and the echo chamber? 

Here, Pope Benedict is particularly insightful when he notes, in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est, that conformity to God means loving as Jesus loved – and Jesus loved both God and neighbor.

 “Love of neighbor,” Pope Benedict wrote, 

consists in the very fact that, in God and with God, I love even the person whom I do not like or even know. This can only take place on the basis of an intimate encounter with God …His friend is my friend … If I have no contact whatsoever with God in my life, then I cannot see in the other anything more than the other, and I am incapable of seeing in him the image of God. 

So, in order to rightly love another, I must first meet God and learn to love Him.

 But there is more. Pope Benedict acknowledges that there are some who have met God and who love religion, but who fail to love their neighbor. Quote: 

if in my life I fail completely to heed others, solely out of a desire to be “devout” and to perform my “religious duties”, then my relationship with God will also grow arid. It becomes merely “proper”, but loveless. Only my readiness to encounter my neighbour and to show him love makes me sensitive to God as well. Only if I serve my neighbour can my eyes be opened to what God does for me and how much he loves me. (18) 

This is a very challenging statement for our times. How many are able to give insightful reflections on scriptures or saints, but fail to help out their roommates or take positions of leadership and volunteering in their parishes and communities? The splendor of the love of God which they currently enjoy will fade unless it is coupled with the love of neighbor! 

This is the great mystery of the Transfiguration. Love comes in the nature of God and in the nature of man – for Jesus loves both! 

The Transfiguration, then, comes as a gift to strengthen the Apostles as it is God and man both who will hang on the Cross – Jesus tries to strengthen their faith so as to love both. 

To conclude, Pope Benedict notes that Love and Truth 

cannot be produced: they can only be received as a gift. 

That which is prior to us and constitutes us — subsistent Love and Truth — shows us what goodness is, and in what our true happiness consists. It shows us the road to true development (CinV 52). 

When Peter and James and John encountered Jesus transfigured before them, bringing to them the glory of Love and Truth, it says they were “terrified.” But Peter finds the words to say: “Lord, it is good that we are here.” He then expresses the desire to establish a tent to Jesus and to Moses and to Elijah – that is, Peter longs to praise God for His glory. And even Moses and Elijah, for Peter recognizes and wishes to praise the glory of God in them. Moses and Elijah have become saints. They have been divinized in the “plan for true life.” 

May our evening here give praise to God. May it radiate the glory of God’s truth, His charity, and the working of His divine, merciful grace. 

This is the work of the Image of God Institute: to transform our minds and hearts so as to become all the more partakers of the divine nature and reflect our Savior’s glory. It is the glory, I am certain, which we will experience in Kasie’s testimony. And it is His glory that will lead us to praise Him and rejoice in Him. 

For “love rejoices in the truth” (1 Cor 13:6) 

God bless your evening and my God bless the work of the Image of God Institute.