From the Mountain

I am writing this Gospel reflection from a cozy cottage at the top of a hill overlooking the ocean. We were gifted a long weekend vacation by a kind parishioner and his wife of our former parish, bless them. Reading that Jesus after leaving the mountain of the transfiguration Mark 9:30-37 travels with his disciples through Galilee, trying to be hidden from the crowds, I thought of the wonderful similarity.

It is so important to make alone time to reflect on significant moments of our life’s journey. Jesus and his disciples had just experienced the transfiguration that marked the beginning of his ‘new exodus’ where the ‘Son of Man, is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him, and after three days he will rise’, and Jesus needed to help his disciples make sense of it all.

I also am completing three months in my new role as pastor of a parish and the Gospel passage challenges me to make sense of my experience. So it is with you, my friend, this week’s Gospel calls you to reflect on your recent journey. What is our ‘new exodus’? Where is Jesus leading us? Like the disciples in this week’s Gospel ‘we may not understand and are afraid to ask him’.

This week’s Gospel passage is a reminder that our journey is one of traveling to the kingdom of God, where we lose our worldly life, for the sake of Jesus, to find a new life in the Spirit. This is not easy. Again, like the disciples, we hold on to old values of power and wealth while kingdom values are of ‘poverty in the spirit’.

I am challenged to understand my new role as one of ‘losing my old life, for Jesus, to find a new life in Jesus’. As St Paul tells us ‘to be all things to all persons so that some may be saved’.

Friend, what is your challenge? How is Jesus helping you make sense of your recent life’s journey? To discern, it is necessary to withdraw from the crowd, to retreat. Retreats can be formal or informal. As I look out from the little porch, to the sea, I thank Jesus for this opportunity to retreat. I pray that He will give me clarity of purpose, as I journey on in this new life.