By the Rev. Jerry J. Pokorsky
The Transfiguration reveals the mystery of the Person of Christ. In his glorified body, he presents himself as the fulfillment of the Law with Moses and of the Prophets with Elijah. He is the beloved Son of the Father, the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity. However, Tabor cannot be separated from Calvary, nor Calvary from the morning of Easter.
The Apostles could not comprehend this immediately. Understanding required time, memory, and grace. What was revealed had to be received before it could be understood. This pattern is woven into human life itself: first the mystery, then the revelation, then understanding. And even understanding does not exhaust the mystery; it opens us to even more.
This same pattern governs ordinary experience. A young person may dedicate himself to manual work without fully knowing why. Skill arrives slowly—through correction, repetition, and trust in those who know more than he does. Over time, he produces something solid and recognizable as his own—perhaps simply a table. However, even then, he did not create it out of nothing. His achievement is built on instruction, materials, discipline, and the wisdom of others. What he does is truly his, but it is not only his.
Our vocations follow a similar path. We consider whether our life should be oriented toward marriage, celibate life, or religious life. The answer rarely comes with initial certainty. Discernment requires observation and trial. Motives must be examined. Decisions arise from attention to circumstances and to God’s direction. As understanding of one’s own vocation grows, deeper questions about purpose, service, and God’s plan may be revealed. Clarity comes only through disciplined inquiry.
Once a vocation is assumed, it requires continuity. Fidelity depends on discipline and constant effort. The vocation is not our voice. When properly discerned, it is the voice of God. We administer his plan for us as faithful stewards. Responsibility arises from fulfilling what has been entrusted to us, rather than imposing our own agendas. The more we understand our vocation, the more aware we become of its depth and its participation in broader mysteries.
Intellectual inquiry also follows a comparable pattern. Integrating the sacraments with everyday life, harmonizing faith and reason, is difficult. Atheists drive a wedge between faith and reason. They often hold that the available evidence does not justify belief in God. They argue that material processes, evolution, and chance explain existence.
But the very existence of the universe raises questions. It is ordered and intelligible. Scientific investigation presupposes that reality is coherent. The question is not whether mechanisms work. They do. But why is the world structured in such a way that rational investigation is possible? Scientific understanding does not exhaust the mystery; it directs reflection toward the transcendent source of intelligibility.
A clock does not assemble itself. Its ordered parts presuppose intelligence. Similarly, the intelligibility of the universe points beyond itself. The questions posed by atheists, if followed honestly, do not lead to dismissing a divine Watchmaker, but to a deeper appreciation of Him.
Recognizing a Creator raises another question: Has He revealed Himself? The Christian claim is yes: through the history of Israel, through the life and teaching of Christ, and through the testimony of the Church. Faith is based on testimony. It allows understanding to develop without eliminating the mystery, and each new insight opens us to deeper truths of God’s plan.
Suffering, of course, presents a persistent challenge. Atheists often ask: «How can a totally good God allow the presence of evil?» A child with cancer presents this reality with terrible clarity.
Suffering in itself is not a moral evil. It is our encounter with disorder, privation, and the effects of sin. No argument eliminates the fact of suffering. Not even an atheist can explain the mystery. The protest against suffering presupposes that things should be otherwise. How does an atheist explain his conviction that they should be so and his own compassion?
Christian teaching places suffering within a broad framework of mystery and revelation. Death and disorder disfigure God’s original design. Original Sin designates a rupture that affects the world and human freedom. These mysterious realities do not answer all questions, but they clarify the origin and persistence of human suffering.
The decisive Christian claim is historical: the Cross. God does not remain distant from suffering. He enters into it. The Cross does not make suffering something good; rather, it underscores the horror of sin. God Himself faces the suffering that afflicts us.
In the Resurrection, Jesus defeats sin, the diabolical source of suffering and death. He redeems humanity and sustains the Church Militant in its participation in his saving work. Redemption does not eliminate suffering from history; it transforms its meaning.
God does not ignore human pain. Jesus wept at the death of his friend Lazarus. Mary’s silent witness at the foot of the Cross shows the human response to suffering: attentive, faithful, and receptive without need for explanation. Her silence is not ignorance, but firm trust. The Resurrection affirms that suffering and death will not prevail.
This same pattern appears in every Mass. In Holy Communion, we do not master the mystery; we are mastered by it. The Eucharist does not eliminate the mystery, but makes it sacramentally present. Each encounter deepens understanding without exhausting the mystery of God Himself.
What God reveals draws us more deeply into that which we still cannot fully comprehend. Faith sustains hope without claiming total clarity, trusting in the promise of «a new heaven and a new earth» beyond the present disorder. Even in Heaven, mystery remains; the joy of understanding deepens endlessly. We possess God’s love. We never possess Him.
The light of the Transfiguration prepares us for the darkness of the Cross. But that is not the end. The Resurrection illuminates both and promises a glory yet unseen. Each gift reveals more than we can bear now, and yet it impels us to advance more deeply on the path.
«Now we see as in a mirror, dimly; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.» (1 Corinthians 13:12)
About the Author
Father Jerry J. Pokorsky is a priest of the Diocese of Arlington. He is the pastor of St. Catherine of Siena Parish in Great Falls, Virginia.