Our lives: Like tadpoles in Jesus

By Patricia Kasten
Compass Associate Editor

Have you ever watched the life cycle of a monarch butterfly. Or a frog?

The feast of the Transfiguration, which we celebrated earlier this month, reminds us that our lives in Christ are like those of a tadpole, or a larva. This is best understood, when you remember that the Transfiguration is linked to the Baptism of the Lord.

• In both, Jesus is in preparation mode. At the baptism, he is preparing for public ministry. At the transfiguration, Jesus is preparing for his death and resurrection. The moment on the mountaintop is a prelude to the ascent of Calvary.

• At both events, there is a manifestation of the Divine presence. At the baptism, heaven opens and the Holy Spirit descends. At the transfiguration, a bright cloud overshadows the mountain.

• Finally, in both events, God's voice affirms that "This is my beloved Son."

These two pivotal points in Jesus' life are both moments of change. Change for Jesus, and change for the history of salvation.

In the original Greek of the first Gospels, the transfiguration is referred to as metemorphothe. This is the same word that gives us the word "metamorphosis," which means to undergo a physical transformation. It is the word used for the transformation of a larva into a butterfly and of a tadpole into a frog.

As Scripture scholar Fr. Daniel Harrington, SJ, put it, the transfiguration "indicates a change of form or shape. The disciples experience a glimpse of Jesus' lordship as it will be fully manifest at the coming of the kingdom."

We can readily understand how the word metamorphosis could refer to the immense transformation that came over Jesus on the mountain (historically Mount Tabor in Galilee) and made him shine with an inner radiance that was the divine glory.

But it's harder to understand how that metamorphosis or transfiguration refers to us.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church offers some insight: "Jesus' baptism proclaimed 'the mystery of the first regeneration,' namely, our baptism; the transfiguration 'is the sacrament of the second regeneration:' our own resurrection. From now on, we share in the Lord's Resurrection through the Spirit who acts in the sacraments of the Body of Christ. The Transfiguration gives us a foretaste of Christ's glorious coming, when he 'will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body.' But it also recalls that 'it is through many persecutions that we must enter the kingdom of God'" (CCC, n. 556).

At the beginning of life - at least of our faith lives - we were immersed in the waters of baptism, not unlike the water surrounding a tadpole. It is a moment of change in our personal history of salvation.

The waters of our baptism served as new birth, as well as reminders of our deaths, linked to Jesus' own death and burial.

Our baptisms were the moment when the Holy Spirit came to rest upon us and to dwell within us - much as the Spirit and the cloud rested over Jesus.

Our baptisms made us adopted children of God.

And our baptisms began a process that will reveal - just as at the transfiguration revealed in Jesus - God's divinity in human form in us. God chooses to dwell with us and, through grace, in us. Through that grace, we receive pivotal moments in our lives that reveal this.

Finally, as that Spirit within Jesus led him onward - first into the desert, then to Calvary, and finally to resurrection - we are also led onward. We follow Jesus from mountaintop to journey to mountaintop again - just as Peter, James and John did.

As Vincentian Fr. Philip Van Linden wrote, "Glimpses of glory that Christians receive from God are real, but according to (Mark's transfiguration account), they are given so that Christians can move on with him, and with him alone."

The revelation of Christ's true image was only glimpsed on Tabor and not fully revealed until after the resurrection. For us, we know that "we are temples of the Spirit" and that God dwells with us, who have been joined to Christ in baptism and Eucharist. Through faith, we know that, at our own resurrections, we shall see the transformation - the metamorphosis - completed.

"The Transfiguration gives us a foretaste of Christ's glorious coming, when he 'will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body'" (CCC, n. 556).

What is now a larva of our true form, living most of the time far from mountaintops, will become a butterfly, as we are revealed as true sons and daughters of God, risen in Christ.