Transfigured Before Them
As we turn our hearts towards all the Lord has in store for us, we feel drawn to ponder with you St. John Paul II’s apostolic exhortation, Vita Consecrata (The Consecrated Life), over the next several months in our meditations.
In this document, our beloved Holy Father meditates on the beauty and reality of consecrated life in the Church and in the world. Sometimes it can be difficult to find resources for discernment of religious life, so we invite you to consider reading this document to form your heart and mind in the Church’s love for consecrated life. In this first meditation, we want to share with you the mystery of the Transfiguration, how it relates to our community in particular, and how St. John Paull II sees this event in Christ’s life as an icon witnessing to the meaning of consecrated life.
In paragraph 14 of Vita Consecrata, the pope describes how the movement of the apostles Peter, James, and John, mirrors the movement of consecrated religious life. These three chosen apostles are called to accompany Jesus as he goes “up the mountain” to pray and be in communion with His Father. They are led “apart” by the Lord to a place of encounter, silence, and contemplation. There, on the mountain, they witness the glory of the transfigured face of Jesus, foreshadowing the Resurrection and the life of the world to come.
The Holy Father points out how this speaks to the heart of consecrated religious life – the Lord extends an invitation to some of His followers to enter into a special relationship with Him, where they leave everything behind to be at the service of His love. This invitation, this call, to consecration, is received in the depths of the human heart and heard in the whispers of silent prayer. The heartbeat of consecrated life is that heart-to-heart, daily time of silent prayer, where the face of the Lord is sought and His mysteries are contemplated. In our own daily life as Sisters of Life, we are truly blessed with the gift of two periods of meditation every day (in addition to our Liturgy of the Hours and our Rosary), one of which is a Holy Hour of Adoration. Our prayer is the center and source of our life, and we would be nothing without Him!
After they have this powerful encounter with the Lord in His glory, the apostles look up and see “only Jesus.” Jesus then invites them to go back down the mountain with Him, and He begins His journey towards Jerusalem for His passion. Our Holy Father talks about how this is also a movement in consecrated religious life – to take the fruits of prayer, to come down the mountain of encounter with God’s glory, and to seek Him in the midst of daily life, and even to find Him in suffering. Ultimately, consecrated religious are invited to surrender their lives along with Jesus into the loving hands of the Father, even when that journey is difficult or challenging. We as Sisters of Life experience this as well – in our missions of service to the most vulnerable, we stand by the Cross of Jesus as He suffers in His little ones, whether they be a vulnerable pregnant woman or a woman suffering after an abortion. We also seek to encounter Him in the midst of the daily ups and downs of community life.
Finally, the Transfiguration has a special place in our lives as Sisters of Life, because our Founder, John Cardinal O’Connor, desired it to be the annual date of our Sisters’ perpetual professions. What a fitting feast on which to make our Final Vows! The glory of the Lord is revealed in the faces and hearts of our Sisters every year as they profess the vows of “poverty, chastity, obedience, and to protect and enhance the sacredness of human life… until death.” From this mountain-top experience, they are called forth daily to give their Yes to Him again. This past August 6, 2024, we were immensely blessed to have 10 Sisters make their Final Vows.
Vita Consecrata contains more beautiful reflections on the Transfiguration and the gift of consecrated life. We are excited to dive into it this year with you. Know of our daily prayers for you. In this month of the Rosary, may Our Lady hold you tenderly in her Immaculate Heart.
The Sisters of Life Vocation Team
Sr. Maria Regina, Sr. Cora, Sr. Mary Hannah
