First Reading

 Genesis 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18

God put Abraham to the test.
He called to him, "Abraham!"
"Here I am!" he replied.
Then God said:
"Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love,
and go to the land of Moriah.
There you shall offer him up as a holocaust
on a height that I will point out to you."

When they came to the place of which God had told him,
Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it.
Then he reached out and took the knife to slaughter his son.
But the LORD's messenger called to him from heaven,
"Abraham, Abraham!"
"Here I am!" he answered.
"Do not lay your hand on the boy," said the messenger.
"Do not do the least thing to him.
I know now how devoted you are to God,
since you did not withhold from me your own beloved son."
As Abraham looked about,
he spied a ram caught by its horns in the thicket.
So he went and took the ram
and offered it up as a holocaust in place of his son.

Again the LORD's messenger called to Abraham from heaven and said:
"I swear by myself, declares the LORD,
that because you acted as you did
in not withholding from me your beloved son,
I will bless you abundantly
and make your descendants as countless
as the stars of the sky and the sands of the seashore;
your descendants shall take possession
of the gates of their enemies,
and in your descendants all the nations of the earth
shall find blessing-
all this because you obeyed my command.


 

Discussion Questions:

1.    In Genesis 15:5 God promised Abraham that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars. It is to this promise that Abraham clings as he raises the knife to kill his son.  Where do you fall on a continuum when blind trust is required of you, with 1 being low and 10 high?

Verse Before the Gospel

CF. MT 17:5 

Gospel

Mark 9:2-10 

Jesus took Peter, James, and John
and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves.
And he was transfigured before them,
and his clothes became dazzling white,
such as no fuller on earth could bleach them.
Then Elijah appeared to them along with Moses,
and they were conversing with Jesus.
Then Peter said to Jesus in reply,
"Rabbi, it is good that we are here!
Let us make three tents:
one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."
He hardly knew what to say, they were so terrified.
Then a cloud came, casting a shadow over them;
from the cloud came a voice,
"This is my beloved Son. Listen to him."
Suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone
but Jesus alone with them.

As they were coming down from the mountain,
he charged them not to relate what they had seen to anyone,
except when the Son of Man had risen from the dead.
So they kept the matter to themselves,
questioning what rising from the dead meant.

The Gospel of the Lord

And he was transfigured before them.

Friends caught a dazed glimpse
of him as he really
was.

In glaring, blinding brightness,
his everyday clothes
dazzling white
as no eyes
on earth
had ever seen.

O Christ,
take us to that mountain.

Transform
our cloudy lives,
all our acts,
our very
 being,

into your
love.

Amen

Deus fit homo ut homo fieret Deus

God became human so that humans might become God

(Catholicism, Page 2 by Fr. Robert Barron)

"The Glory of God is a human being fully alive."

Meyers, Robin R. (2009-02-19).  Saving Jesus from the Church: How to Stop Worshiping Christ and Start Following Jesus (Kindle Location 639).  Harper Collins, Inc..  Kindle Edition.

Do small things today and for many tomorrows,
with a generous heart.