Carry the gospel with you

Gospel reading of the day:

Mark 9:2-13

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; then from the cloud came a voice, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.” Suddenly, looking around, the disciples 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. Then they asked him, “Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?” He told them, “Elijah will indeed come first and restore all things, yet how is it written regarding the Son of Man that he must suffer greatly and be treated with contempt? But I tell you that Elijah has come and they did to him whatever they pleased, as it is written of him.”

Reflection on the gospel reading: The theme of the gospel readings over the last several days has been the question of who Jesus is. Just as the blind man received sight only slowly in a passage several days ago, the revelation of Jesus to his disciples does not come all at once, but only step-by-step. Peter proclaims Jesus messiah, but even Peter does not understand that the messiah has a cross to carry before he could claim the full glory that Jesus manifests in today’s gospel in the Transfiguration. The truth is that even the apostles never fully appreciate the depth of the revelation of God’s presence they experience in Jesus until Pentecost with its gift of the Spirit. Like the apostles, we live in the depths and breadth of a great mystery–but lost in minutia and passing concerns. It is only through the gift of God that we slowly unravel the deepest meaning of what we experience as we move through our lives and the world.

Saint of the day: Stefan Wincenty Frelichowski was born in 1913 in Poland. A priest, he died in Dachau on February 23, 1945. He is the patron of Polish scouting. He joined Scouting on March 21, 1927. Stefan served as Patrol leader and later as Troop Leader and during his years in the High Seminary of Pelplin Diocese he was an active member of its Scout Club. He also was an active member of the Marian Congregation and from the age of nine, Stefan had been an altar boy. During his years in the seminary of Pelpin he was active in the Temperance movement. On March 14, 1937 he was ordained a priest in Pelpin. In the following years he served as a priest in Pelpin and Torun’. While working as a priest he continued his studies on the university of Lwów. In Torun’ he was responsible for the parish press. In 1938 he became leader of the Old Scouts and chaplain of the scout district Pomerania. Arrested by the Gestapo on October 18, 1939, he was imprisoned in the German concentration camps Stutthof, Grenzdorf, Sachsenhausen and Dachau where he died. Working with the typhus patients in the camp, he himself contracted the disease and died of it. On June 7, 1999 Stefan Wincenty Frelichowski was beatified.

Spiritual reading: Have we ever kept quiet, even though we wanted to defend ourselves when we had been unfairly treated? Have we ever forgiven someone even though we got no thanks? Have we ever been absolutely lonely? Have we ever tried to love God when we are no longer being borne on the crest of the wave of enthusiastic feeling? Let us search in our life. If we find such experiences, then we have experienced the Spirit. (Karl Rahner)