Second Sunday of Lent

Dominica II in Quadragesima A
1 March 2026

 Lent is a privileged season of renewal in our life as disciples. It is not renewal in the sense that we might renew a membership in a club or renew a streaming service. The best focus for our Lent is to see this season as a blessed opportunity for renewal in our relationship with Jesus the Lord. Relationships need ongoing work and they require effort. If we don’t communicate in a relationship, you can bet that relationship will suffer. If one person does all the talking, you are probably setting yourself up for something that is one-sided and less like a mutual exchange. If we treat our relationships as transactional, meaning we have time for the other mainly when we want or need something, then things are heading south. When it is more about “getting” than about “giving”, things go awry. If one party rarely listens… well, one day that will end and you’ll get an earful.

We can apply much of this to our life with the Lord. Lent is about placing an intense focus on the redeeming actions of the Lord by which we are saved. We recall the historical events of the Lord going up to Jerusalem and the Mount of Calvary as we gradually ascend, throughout Lent, “the holy mountain of Easter” (Ceremonial of Bishops, 249). For the baptized, Lenten renewal is an invitation to recommit ourselves to our baptismal promises. For those in adult formation in OCIA, Lent is the final intense preparation for being received into the Church and being admitted to the Easter Sacraments, where they, too, are called to join all of us in deeper life with the Lord and deeper union with the Church the Lord established. Lent is a season that has some happy coincidences with things like spring training and spring cleaning. And so, we pray more intensely. We take on mortifications and penances, like freely taking up fasting and abstaining from meat. We seek to have a heart for others, for service in charity, as we give alms. We confess. We commit ourselves to more regular confession to more worthily present ourselves for Holy Communion. We pray with the Passion of the Lord at Stations of the Cross.

But there is something much more simple, yet critical, that I want to focus on this weekend. I think the Transfiguration has a spiritual application to how we approach this Lenten time of renewal with the Lord, the renewal of better relationship practices with the Lord. Now you might be tempted to say, “Father, we are a week and a half into Lent already. You are a little late with this lesson for our relationship with the Lord”. Fair enough. But the good news is that Lenten renewal is not just for Lent but is intended to foster better spiritual life all year. Even if you didn’t start Lent this way, you can still adopt the spiritual lesson I am about to describe.

So, before Lent started, how did you prepare? How did you decide how you would observe Lent this year? If you are like me and how I prepare for Lent, then you are like Peter in the Gospel. By which I mean, like Peter, my Lent preparation goes something like this: “Okay, Lord, here we are. It’s Lent. It’s a privileged opportunity for renewal. Let’s do something. I’m going to do more fasting. I’m going to choose more days for fasting and abstaining from meat. I am going to say these certain prayers. I’m going to accomplish these spiritual practices that I have been missing. Let’s go. Let’s do this”! Can you see how that sounds like Peter in the Gospel: “Lord, it is good that we are here… I will make three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah”. And, like Peter, I am busy speaking… and planning… and doing. The spiritual lesson and the relationship lesson for our life with Jesus is much more simple, but challenging. As good as all those spiritual practices we might plan are – and, to be clear, they are! Please do those practices and penances. – let’s not forget a simple reality about relationship: if we don’t communicate with the Lord well; if we do all the talking; if we go to the Lord mostly in a more transactional way when we need or want something; if it is more about “getting” than “giving”; if one party to the relationship is slow to listen… Ah, there it is! There is our simple lesson for Lent. For all the true lessons we can learn from the Transfiguration, there is that simple lesson for Lent and for the whole year and for our entire life as disciples. We practice this lesson in prayer. It happens in giving of my time to the Lord. It happens in making use of the Scriptures for meditation. It happens in noticing how much noise and activity is in my life, from all of my plans and all of my “doing”, including the airpods that feed my ears and mind with what I want and determine ahead of time. The Transfiguration gives Peter… and me… and maybe you a simple lesson: “This is my beloved Son…. Listen to him”!