Transfiguration and Thin Places

The Transfiguration - Dominic Martinelli

Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him
 Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray.
 And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed,
and his clothes became dazzling white.
 Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him.
  They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure,
which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.
 Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep;
but since they had stayed awake,
they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him.
 Just as they were leaving him, Peter said to Jesus,
"Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings,
one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah" -- not knowing what he said.
 While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them;
and they were terrified as they entered the cloud.
 Then from the cloud came a voice that said,
"This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!"

Luke 9:28-35

This is Transfiguration Sunday, always the Sunday before the beginning of the season of Lent in the liturgical year. Lots of preachers do not like this Sunday because it's, well, a tad weird. Jesus and three disciples hike up a mountain (Hermon? Tabor?) and have a mystifying encounter with two Jewish mountaintop superheroes who had been dead for hundreds of years. There are clouds and confusion and a lame attempt on the part of the disciples to make sense of the incomprehensible.



Transfiguration: Armando Alemdar Ara

Someone suggested recently that this is an example of a "thin place" encounter, in the spirit of the Celtic Christian tradition of places and times when the "membrane" between this life and what is beyond is gossamer thin and permeable. It almost certainly predated Christianity in Ireland with the festival of Samhain becoming Halloween and All Saints and Souls Days. The cheery goblins and carved pumpkins of Halloween had their origins in serious attempts to ward off the unwelcome spirits, even as the welcome saints and ancestors were celebrated.

In a reflection on thin places Carl McColman offers that:

certain places truly are holy places, numinous places, places of sacrality — a college word that means “pertaining to the sacred.” It’s what theologians call “the scandal of particularity.” It was originally applied to the Christian belief that Jesus is the one savior of all humankind — and even more than that, the one incarnation of the second person of the Trinity.
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/carlmccolman/2017/05/thin-places-celtic-pre-celtic-universal/

Perhaps on this Transfiguration Sunday we can ponder where our thin places are and who we encounter there. We may be like the disciples, confused by the moment and the implications of who Jesus is for us. But it's worth the climb.

Comments? Thin Places?

More Transfiguration...and a volcano!...in today's Groundling blog
https://groundlingearthyheavenly.blogspot.com/2019/03/volcanoes-and-transfiguration.html