Transfiguration A, 2023 + Listening for the Morning Star + 2.19.23

 

St Paul’s Emmanuel, Santa Paula / All Santos Oxnard
The Rev. Alene Campbell-Langdell

 

We have seen what cannot be named.  That’s my best summary of what our reading from Peter’s second letter seems to be saying.  “We have seen what cannot be named.”  To his credit, Peter gives it a valiant try, “We had been eyewitnesses of [Jesus’] majesty” (1:16).  “[Jesus] received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory” (1:17).  “We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with [Jesus] on the holy mountain” (1:18).  “Glory” “Majestic Glory” “Holy”:  All of these are words attempting to describe some aspect of the divine.  But what do these words actually mean?  Is it possible to define any of them satisfactorily without ending up going around in circles?

For instance, an online search for the etymology of the word “glory” will bring up a reference to glory as the praise of something or someone who has glory or is glorious.  Scroll further down and you will find a reference to its use in the Biblical Latin to translate the Greek word, “Doxa,” meaning expectation, and its further use to translate a Hebrew term meaning “shining” or “brightness.”  Search for the origins of the word “holy” and you will find that it comes from a German word meaning “blessed” and is also used to translate a Hebrew word meaning “set apart.”  So, “glory” is the praise of something that is bright and shining and fills us with expectation. It is glorious!  Is the mountain holy because it is somehow blessed and set apart or is it blessed and set apart because it is holy? 

 

            Much has been said in recent years of the Church’s need to de-churchify its language—to use language that can be understood by the stranger walking through our doors.  On one level that is true.  Paul writing to the Corinthians made the point that if the one you are speaking to doesn’t understand what is being said, it isn’t very edifying![1] Yet, listen for any length of time to popular music and the religious language is hard to miss.  There are references to Mary and David, “broken Hallelujahs”[2] and things that are “unholy” just to name a few.  And so today, on this Feast of the Transfiguration, I wonder if the challenge to us church-folk is less about using words that everyone understands and more about wrestling both what we have experienced and what we will never understand—at least in this life. 

Today’s celebration is all about allowing ourselves to be drawn into the Mystery, allowing ourselves to be filled with hope and expectation at a Light we can barely glimpse, let alone name.  In the reading from Exodus, Moses is told to climb a mountain and be there.  Our translation uses the word “wait,” but the word in Hebrew and the effect of the story evokes a progressive drawing of Moses into God’s presence, which is described as both “cloud” and “devouring fire.”  Moses leaves the elders of the people and begins to ascend with his assistant Joshua.  Then, in verse 12, we are told again that “Moses went up on the mountain,” but this time there is no mention of Joshua.  Moses is alone as a cloud covers Mount Sinai for 6 days.  And then, at last, Moses is drawn “farther up and farther in”[3] as Moses enters the cloud and remains on the mountain for a very long time. 

 

Today we end the season of Epiphany, another word coined to describe the indescribable.  In this case it is an attempt at naming that moment of revelation when what was hidden is suddenly revealed, when we catch a fleeting glimpse that there is Something deeper at work in the world.  The season’s readings are filled with “signs” (as John would call them)--signs that Jesus is something more than a prophet or a healer or a teacher, though he is certainly all of those things.  This last day of Epiphany is Jesus’ Coming Out day when for a very brief amount of time three specially chosen disciples are allowed to see Jesus’ divinity.  And then, they are told to wait.  Specifically, they are told to keep quiet, to sit with the mystery, “until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead” (Matthew 17:9).

Like the disciples, we in the Church are entering a time of waiting, a time of silence and uncertainty, while we wait for a resurrection that we don’t understand.  This time is symbolized by the period we call Lent, but don’t mistake the symbol for the reality that it is meant to teach.  For there will come a time in all of our lives when the pieces fall apart.  There will always come a time when the worst has happened and the resurrection has not yet come.  And when that time comes, don’t try to run away or escape the inescapable.  Allow your expectations to be shattered.  Keep quiet and allow your soul to return to that moment on the mountain when you were surrounded and absorbed by something or someone that filled you with wonder and changed the way you lived.  Let yourself ponder what can’t be named and listen for a song that is as wondrous and impossible as “morning stars singing together”[4] or an angelic chorus over shepherd’s fields or as improbable as a voice whispering that you are loved by the One who created the mountain in the first place. 

Stay in that place until the shattered pieces begin to rebuild into something new.  There will be time enough for Glorias and Alleluias when the resurrection happens.  For now it is enough to sit in wonder, drawn into the mystery, listening for the morning star. 

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[1] 1 Corinthians 14:9

[2] Leonard Cohen, “Hallelujah,” c. 1984.

[3] C.S. Lewis, in The Last Battle, Chapter 16, “Farewell to Shadowlands”

[4] Job 38:7