in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. To conclude our retreat together, I would like to say a few words about the Transfiguration. The whole thing was meant as building up towards the Transfiguration as a kind of preparation for the Feast of the Transfiguration. So I was very happy about the timing. It was a preparation for the Transfiguration because it was about what we put into the sentence The glory of God is the human being fully alive. That glory of God, of the human being fully alive, shines forth in the transfiguration.

[01:05]

So, we spoke about what we mean by God, the glory of God, and we spoke about what we mean by the human. Now we see that glory of God shining in and through the human. And it is our paternal feast, as we say, at Mount Saviour. And what does that mean? It means that all that the Feast of the Transfiguration wants to tell us is what Mount Saviour stands for. It's much more than just having a patron saint whom you venerate and then on his feast you venerate him very specially. It's more than that. By choosing the Transfiguration as our special feast day, Fr.

[02:08]

Damascus meant to express that is what we stand for. And if you take the text and go through the text of the Gospels, three of the synoptics speak about it, all three synoptics speak about it. We have everywhere the high mountain apart, a high mountain apart. The mountain is, of course, Mount Saviour. It's not a terribly high mountain, but the idea is to lift up your heart. That is the idea. A mountain invites us to lift up our heart, to look for the higher thing. to get a wider view as you look down, and certainly if you look down at the big flats, you have a very wide view from up here. Lifting up your eyes, there's this important passage in the Hebrew Bible, I lift up my eyes to the mountains, I lift up my eyes to the mountains, from where the good tidings come, and also

[03:33]

On the mountain, we still lift up our eyes. It's a place where you lift up your eyes, and you remember how important that was for Father Tamsin, lifting up your eyes, always looking higher, looking about the rim of your plate quite a bit, you know. So it's a high mountain and it's a mountain apart. So solitude does play a very important role in what Mount Sevius stands for. It's a very important aspect. It's one aspect, it's not the only aspect, but it is a very important aspect. Luke adds to this high mountain apart that the other two synoptics have, Luke adds to pray. He went up there to pray and he repeats that as he was praying he was transfigured.

[04:39]

That is typical for the Gospel of Luke because Luke puts a great emphasis on prayer and very often tells us that Jesus went to be alone and pray So, he was interested in that particular aspect, but when we think about what Mount Sevius stands for, it certainly stands for a high place apart for prayer, and it's meant to be a prayerful place. Mount Tabor in Galilee is actually a pretty high mountain, and it's not so high in absolute elevation, but it comes right out of the plain, and so it looks really, really high.

[05:43]

So when you stand up there, it's comparable to standing on a peak in the Alps, actually. And also the ride up there is neck-breaking, especially the bus, because the buses are too big to take these hairpin curves. So it is quite an impressive mountain, that Mount Piba. We are not absolutely sure, it doesn't mention in the gospels that it was Mount Tabor, but it is unlikely, and there's an ancient tradition that it was there. And then it was important to Fr. Demetrius. Fr. John said we have a homily by Fr. Demetrius on the Transfiguration and we wanted to play it tomorrow at the meal, but unfortunately it isn't good enough quality to be heard there.

[06:44]

But with your earphones you could hear it, and I would like to do that myself, so that would be very helpful. But I remember that it was important to him, that passage, and Jesus took Peter and James and John, he took his trusted friends with him. Very often It says in the Gospels, in all three synoptics, that Jesus went to pray alone. He went to the mountain alone. So he could have gone here alone, too. But apart from other considerations, he did want to take his friends along this time. He's tossed the twins, so a little community, even a special community within the community of the apostles. And that aspect was important to her one father, and that's why there were three farms that were bought to make Mount Savior, and one was down St.

[07:56]

James that is still there, and the other one was St. Peter's, which is up here, has been renovated and fixed very beautifully, but there was St. John's, and that was between the two, where there's lots of trees now, you remember, of course, and that was our first novitiate. We had to get up very early and run up the hill because it was pretty far and steep to get the vigils. It often looked a little messy up there. One time, a group of sisters came. And downstairs was the room where the guests could come, and upstairs is where the novices lived. So a group of sisters came downstairs, and of course they were nosy, and two of them went up and looked around and said, couldn't breathe, this looks like a mess, and they started sweeping and making the beds and cleaning everything up.

[08:58]

And then they came back down and didn't say anything. And then the other two also got nosy and sneaked up and came down and said, this is terrific. These monks, they keep everything speak in Spanish. And they didn't give us away, but they told us. So, this was St. John's. So, there were these three apostles who were here on the hill and then the chapel for Jesus. That was very important. And unfortunately, St. John's was in very poor repair. It was an old building and small. And it seemed too much to maintain all these buildings, so the Golden Grove Fire Police was very happy to use it for an exercise, and they set it on fire and then didn't completely rescue it, but then it was an exercise, and in the end it was gone.

[10:06]

So, I think it's important to remember that to this mountain belong also these close friends of Jesus, because of community. First of all, of course, our monastic community, but then also the extended community, to extend the community, and extend it potentially without limits. The Transfiguration is a key event of salvation, and it is open to all. And all are invited to the extent to which they are open to it, to celebrate it here with us. I mention this extended family and extended community especially because I noticed that at the celebration of the Eucharist, which is of course, as we said, the high point of our life and the center of our life,

[11:13]

At this stage, there's a bit of a gap between the guests and the monks, and even at the kiss of peace, there's no exchange. So I spoke to Father John about it, and he said, yes, it took very long and got a little out of hand, so we decided to give the box only to the people next to us. And that, of course, leaves the guests out. And I talked with him and maybe he would bring it up again. I think it might be good, one doesn't have to go overboard, but to a little bit express that, if you imagine coming here as a guest and then there's this moment of the kiss of peace and the monk gives one another a kiss of peace and I'm left out, there's something lacking there, something not quite there. But anyway, this community belongs to Mount Tabor and therefore also to Mount Saviour.

[12:24]

And then, of course, comes the mystery of the Transfiguration. And how should we, in the terms that we have used in these past days, how should we express what happens at this transfiguration? And one way of saying it would be that the self shines through the eye of Jesus, eye because not the eyes, but the I. The I shines through the self, because the self is that Christ self, and much of the time it is hidden. It is hidden in all of us, and that is why C.S. Lewis says somewhere, I can't remember exactly where, he says, If we could see another person, any other person, and really see what we encounter there, he said we would fall down to the ground like the apostles of Montevideo fell down to the ground, overwhelmed by the presence of God.

[13:44]

The presence of God is in every human being, and the reason why we can so easily just overlooked that, is that it is hidden, it's a hidden presence, but on that particular occasion it shines forth, and it's a true peak experience also for Jesus. In the sense in which we have spoken about peak experiences, one can probably say that was for Jesus a peak experience, and in our own peak experiences we experience that oneness with all, that limitless oneness. So, we experience a presence of God, but from a theological point we can even go further and we can say The Christ reality, this Christ self, what we call the Christ self, fills Jesus completely.

[14:52]

Jesus is completely filled with this Christ self, but the Christ self is a law, is infinitely bit greater than Jesus. You see, Jesus is like a wonderful vessel that's full with ocean water, but the whole vessel is immersed in the ocean. That's the panentheistic vision. Each one of us participates in that Christ reality, so we do not let it shine forth as beautifully and as purely as Jesus did, but we are called to do that, and it is the same Christ Self that lives in each one of us and lives in Jesus. Theologically, this is very For instance, St.

[15:55]

Paul says, we have to fill up in our lives what is lacking in the sufferings of the Christ. He doesn't say in the sufferings of Jesus. Jesus had the full suffering, but the Christ, the Logos, suffers in each one of us and suffers out of love. Suffering is an earthly expression of love, belonging to all creatures, it belongs to us. So that's important in the context of the Transfiguration, always to keep in mind that this concerns us. It's not only the icon of Jesus standing out there. We have such a beautiful icon in the chapel. It's just wonderful. I just looked at it a little while ago.

[16:57]

But it's not just out there. We are completely part of it. We are completely part of it. It can't be overstressed. And our Savior stands also not only for the transfiguration of Jesus, but with this transfiguration, the whole universe is transfigured. Everything is transfigured. A human being, as we said, but also every animal, every plant, everything participates in this transfiguration. God shines forth through it. And Mount Saviour wants to be transparent for heaven. A little piece of earth turns transparent for heaven. And anybody who comes here should see that and therefore say how wonderful it is to be here.

[18:05]

And Elizabeth Barrett Browning has a famous for a line in which he says, the whole earth is crammed with heaven, crammed full with heaven, and every common bush is afire with God, but only he who sees takes off his shoes. The rest sits around and picks blackberries. That's not quite the rise to the occasion. Only the one who sees takes off his shoes. That means in every common bush we can see the burning bush. And the rabbis turn that around, they have a different interpretation. They say, Moses hears the voice out of the burning bush, take off your shoes, this is holy ground.

[19:08]

And the rabbis say we should not understand it in the sense in which Elizabeth Browning understood it. In a holy place you take off your shoes, like you take off your shoes before you go even in a Muslim temple and in many other temples you take off your shoes. So it is an expression of reverence. No, the rabbis say, this voice says explicitly, do not come closer take off your shoes. That means wherever you are, if you take off your shoes, you realize that you are on holy ground. Wherever you are, you don't have to come closer to the burning book. Take off your shoes and wherever you are, you will be aware that you're standing on holy ground, because the only reason why you do not realize it is that you put something dead between your live souls and the holy ground, namely dead skin of dead animals, leather, you see, and they say, and that deadness, that stands for getting used to it.

[20:26]

So, take off the getting used to it and you will be standing on holy ground wherever you are. It's the getting used to it that keeps you in exile. The rabbis say, what was the real exile? Was it to be far away in Babylon? No, it was getting used to it. No matter how much they were in Babylon, if they knew they were in exile, they were still connected with God. But if they got used to the exile, to Babylon, then they were really in exile. So, this speaks to us. The Transfiguration invites us to see everything transfigured, to take off the sandals of getting used to it, of being used to it, and look at everything with fresh eyes as if you saw it for the first time. Then come Elijah and Moses, Moses and Elijah, and Marxist Moses and Elijah,

[21:41]

No, no. Matthew says Moses and Elijah, and Luke says Moses and Elijah, and Mark says Elijah with Moses. And that should make us… Listen, it is as if you were saying, well, Moses you expect, but Elijah was with him. Elijah was also there. It's a little underlined. We know that Moses stands for the law and Elijah stands for the prophets. And there are two strands of tradition that go through the Hebrew Bible. the priestly tradition and the prophetic tradition. And the priestly tradition fuses with the king, the court tradition. That was the establishment. So there is the establishment tradition

[22:44]

And many texts are from the establishment tradition, and then there is the prophetic tradition, and that's always against the establishment, always criticizing the establishment. And when Rabbi Sacks said in the book that we were just now reading in the refectory that the Hebrew Bible is full with self-reproach and self-criticism, One has to say one strand of that tradition is full of self-criticism, the other one is not. But we fall into that erroneous, we fall into lots of erroneous ideas by speaking of the Bible. only since 500 years do they speak of the Bible, and that came about when the scriptures, in plural, were bound together in one book, and that was called the book, Biblio.

[24:00]

Biblios, the Bible. And before that, everybody was speaking about the scriptures. And these scriptures, for the Protestants then, this book became, so to say, a handbook, and handed out by God. It must have everything in it. And what about the contradiction? Well, they are explained away and so forth. We don't have to go to all this mental acrobatics. What we call the Bible is the account of the wrestling of our ancestors in the faith all the way from Abraham with that mystery, wrestling with it, thinking about it. Some thought in this way, some thought differently. They clashed with one another. That's perfectly fine. If it isn't God's voice speaking there, you see, to us and contradicting itself, sure,

[25:11]

It is much more venerable to me if I look at it realistically as what it is, but that Grappling with the mystery, inspired by God, of course inspired, but not inspired in the way that when it says that the rabbit is a ruminator because it goes like that, that must be a natural fact. They're not interested. Rabbits were not clean, and so they say it's a ruminator that doesn't have cloven hooves. Those are minor points, but the major point is let's give the books, the scriptures, the holy scriptures, really their holiness as being the residue, the record of our ancestors' faith, grappling with that mystery of God in many different ways and in many different fashions, letters, poems, historical accounts, myths,

[26:26]

a drama even, the book of Job, in all different forms they are grappling with it, and we inherit that. And I'm pretty sure this is also the reason why pathways in Holy Scripture, then we could have called it Bible, now we call it Holy Scripture, and took every single book not the book, you see, but not the Bible, but Father Demas's Pathways in Holy Scripture, take the different books that is much more traditional, much more original, and comes much closer to what these sacred books really are. I thought it was important to put that in here, in this context, because we have prophets and the institutional religion, the law, and we have the monk corresponding to it and the institutional church.

[27:37]

not in opposition, but two very different ways, and one has to clearly see that and do justice to it. And these two then speak with Jesus, who belongs to the prophetic tradition, when you follow the Hebrew Bible, and Jews will also say, and they will recognize that, that he was one of our prophets, if they are open-minded. And they speak about his transitus. Luke says that very explicitly. And Luke says, in Jerusalem. But that is because for Luke, everything has to come from Jerusalem, go to Jerusalem, and Jerusalem is very important to him. So he says, his transcendence explicitly is in Jerusalem.

[28:42]

But when you look closely, Jesus did not die in Jerusalem. He died outside Jerusalem. He was excommunicated. And yet, he himself said, no prophet can die outside of Jerusalem. What does that mean? Not willingly, you see. thrown out and killed outside, that's a different story. But willingly, to be a prophet demands two very difficult things, to stand in and to speak out. Did we mention that already? Did we mention that in the Course? Because that's so important. It is often difficult enough to stay in and just blend with the woodwork and stay in at least, and it is difficult enough to speak out and then quickly get out before they get you, but to combine these two, to stand in and speak out, it really

[29:50]

draws the cross. Standing in is the steepest, and speaking out is the horizontal beam of the cross, and that is demanded of each one of us. If you get out, you are just an outside critic, but if you stand in, whatever that is, the community, the church, the world, you could say, stop the world, I want to get off. One is often inclined to say that, you know. No, stay in and speak out. That is this. And we are, each one of us, anointed as king and priest and prophet. Both, we stand in both traditions. And that has a lot to do also with our relationship then to the community. And it's interesting that Peter speaks here all the time.

[30:56]

Peter is, of these three apostles, Peter is singled out, of course, because he's the prince of the apostles and was the leader of the early church. But it is also important in this particular narrative, because the transfiguration is thereby set in relationship to the passion where Peter betrays Jesus, and there's a deliberate connection between the transfiguration and the passion he sees, and yet he denies Jesus. And then in the end, is forgiven in John's Gospel, but it is that Peter is the link between the transfiguration and the passion of Jesus, that transitus.

[31:58]

And then I have already mentioned all three Synoptics agree in quoting exactly with the same words, it is good for us to be here. That is the one sentence that is really verbatim the same everywhere. Others are very close. Yes, it's good for us to be here. And I can really imagine Peter saying, or the other disciple saying, that's what Peter said. He didn't know what to say. He was just so confused. He said, oh, it's good to be here. This is heaven. But it also says that they were afraid, exceedingly afraid, it says, and that is that awe. You see, that is again, on the one hand it's good to be here, that's fascinating, and at the same time it makes us tremble, both together, that's then this awe, the exceeding

[33:13]

afraid, exceedingly afraid, not fearful but shuddering. And what does Peter say? Father Damascus used to say, obviously this joy, it is good to be here, this is a wonderful time we are having here, reminded Peter of the Feast of Tabernacles. For the time, it's always connected with the Feast of Tabernacles, because at the Feast of Tabernacles, the Jews to this day build little hearts made out of boughs, and spend a lot of time in there with their families, eating, drinking, making merry, having a great time. It's kind of like our Thanksgiving, where the whole family comes together and celebrates. And they do that in these sukkoth. Sukkoth, they are called. That's what these tabernacles are.

[34:17]

Again, I got that from Father Damasus. He put great emphasis on it, that the remembrance is to the time in the desert. That's why they built it, to remember you lived in such huts while you were going through the desert. 40 years. And at that time, the people were really together. They were together with one another, and they were constantly confronted with the mystery, constantly in the face of God. And these two aspects are celebrated in the Feast of Tabernacles, and therefore, Father Damasus stressed the instructions, the Jewish rabbis give instructions for how to build these tabernacles, and they are so significant. Build the walls very lightly so that you can see your neighbors.

[35:24]

and build the roof very lightly so that you can see the stars at night. So you are connected with God and you're connected with neighbor, and that's why it is such a wonderful place. It's good for us to be there. It's good for us where we are together with our brothers, The walls is okay, but very thin walls, and the roof is okay, but very thin roof. There's the stars, there's the mystery of the night sky. And it is in the desert that God speaks to our heart. It is in the desert, speaks to our heart. And so whatever we build should be built in such a way that we are not cutting ourselves off from others and that we don't cut ourselves off from contact with the mystery.

[36:28]

And right after Peter says, let us build, let us build, the account says he did not know what he was saying. He was all confused. Why was he confused when he talked about building? Because he forgot the now. This was a now moment. What could be more of a now moment than a peak experience? There was obviously three peak experiences par excellence on the top of the mountain table. And he thinks about building, let's be sure that for the future we also have a place to stay. So that's why he was really out of it. And there's an interesting element, it's not so important, but Luke says their eyes were heavy with sleep.

[37:37]

He's the only one that says their eyes were heavy with sleep, so it seems that he depicts the Transfiguration during the night. that this light shines during the night, the light of Christ, and it's also made more likely that this is what he meant, because when the others speak about coming down from the mountain, he just very briefly says, the next day when they came down from the mountain, so apparently that was night and next day, but there's also a mystical background to it, In the Song of Songs, the bride says, I sleep but my heart is awake. That's a very beautiful sentence and it stands for the mystic experience and I remember Swami Satchitananda, I don't know why I mentioned that to him at one point, this sentence,

[38:39]

And he was enthusiastic about it. Yes, yes, that expresses it so well. That expresses this whole, our whole mystic experience. I sleep, but my heart is awake. I am in an attitude like in very deep, dreamless sleep, and yet my heart is awake. And that is why Luke says, possibly, while Luke says here, their eyes were heavy with sleep, but they were wide awake listening what was happening. He says they didn't fall asleep, they didn't listen what was going on here. So, maybe that is also one of the meanings. And then, of course, the main point the voice from heaven, the cloud of God's presence, like in the desert there was the cloud of God's presence, the Shekinah, and this is here again, it refers again to the desert time, and the voice says, listen, this is my beloved son, and I said before,

[39:51]

Let's not be so overawed by this icon, by this event that is told here, that we do not include ourselves. We wouldn't do anybody a service. The voice says to Jesus Christ, this is my beloved Son. What? We are in Him and He is in us. I live in Him, He lives in me," says St. Paul. I live, yet not I. Christ lives in me. So this is said to each one of us. This is my beloved Son. You should hear that when it is read in the Gospel. This means you. This means me. Then it says, And this is how we express, as Christians in general, as humans even, but especially as monks, that is how we express our sonship, by listening, by listening.

[40:58]

This is my beloved son, listen to him. He is our Lord, our highest authority. listen to him. That is, of course, the Asculta, the very first word of the Holy Rule, and that is our vocation, to listen. And if you want to think this through, we didn't go into details about it, but you can even understand stability as a listening. It's a listening to the community, because stability binds you to the community. And Saint Benedict says that we should be listening to one another. The monks should be obedient, listening to one another. So stability binds us to the community.

[42:00]

Obedience binds us to the abbot and monastic life. binds us to the holy rule and to the whole monastic tradition that stands behind it. So, listen to one another, instability, listen to the abbot, inobedience, listen to the holy rule and to the whole monastic tradition that is in it and behind it, again, transforming your life thereby. Contemplation in action, this is really. Oh yes, and this is what we vow, you see, we vow this listening because we vow stability and obedience and conversion of life.

[43:03]

We vow that, and once we have... I wanted to say something about this vow because it came up in a conversation and it's important enough for all of us to be aware of that. Father Damascus stressed whenever we spoke about vows and taking vows and so forth, he stressed When you reach the point where you can take your vows, yes, you are doing something, but that is less than half of it. The other half is that God promises you. When you take vows and you reach the point, God promises you that God will see you through on this path. And he said, from then on, do not ask whether you should go this way, but only how. You have not enough energy to question this. No more questioning. This is a liberation, it's a freeing. That's my way.

[44:06]

God has shown it to me. I don't have to go back to it again and again, was that the right way? That's the whole point of vows. Not that you bind yourself and I can never get out of it or anything like that. That's not a law. I had this incredible grace that God promised me, allowed me to reach the point where I could take a vow, which means God promises me, no matter what happens, I will see you through on this path of monastic life. That's incredibly freeing, and it's also still included in this, listen to him. And then Right afterwards it says, and when they looked up they saw no one but Jesus. That's such a beautiful sentence.

[45:07]

This is, in a way, what we too should do. See, no one but Jesus in everybody, you see, not separated from everybody. See, nobody but Jesus wherever we look. That should be the effect of the transfiguration. And then it was Damasus always put great emphasis on coming down from the mountain. This is not the end of this. The coming down from the mountain is very important, and in the early days, Many of the community were reading the Carmelite mystics, and especially the ascent to Mount Carmel, you see. And Father Thomas had a little Maybe a little point against that.

[46:11]

After all, you Benedictines try and live the Benedictine spirituality. It's okay to read the other one, but we had some monks there who were just gung-ho on the ascent to Mount Carmel. And so he said, forget the ascent to Mount Carmel. Focus on the descent from Mount Tabor. And what does this descent from Mount Ewa mean? It means, don't talk about it. He said, Nelson, on the way down, don't talk about it until it happens. Don't talk. Do it. Enter into this transitus yourself, you see. This transitus is what we pray in the Creed, there's a whole inclusion in the Creed. First you have a belief in the Father, Creed of Heaven and Earth, His only Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, again two things, conceived by the Holy Spirit, so you have the Holy Trinity,

[47:13]

born of the Virgin Mary and suffered under Pontius Pilate. These two things belong together. The mystic, born of the Virgin Mary, the mystic, and suffered the clash with the power structure. And then comes a long inclusion, crucified, died, was buried, Descended into hell. Four points. Very short, because it's so sad. When you're sad, you say it very briefly. Crucified. One word. Buried. crucified, died, buried, only at one birth, and descended into the netherworld. Those are not additional things, just three ways of saying he suffered on the cross and died. And that's what Fr.

[48:17]

Damascus called the descending line of this transfiguration. And now, on the third day, he rose again. But now, instead of these short statements, they're very long statements. On the third day he rose again, it's longer than, Kojima died and descended into the netherworld. Just this one thing is so long, because we are so happy, we are bubbling over with words. On the third day he rose again, ascended into heaven. He's seated at the right hand of the Father. And we come from there to judge the living and the dead. And they are all parallel, the other ones, where he was. He was sentenced to death, he will come as the judge. He was under the judgment, he will come as judge. And we enter into this, we enter into that transitus Christi by, as we said, living the life of the hero.

[49:31]

This transitus is the hero's life. goes down into death, and behold, he lives, entering into the sacrifice, which is simply the ritual for the hero myth, and living gratefully, because that is the way in which we express it. So that's right in one line of all that we discussed here in the retreat, and it's contained in the word, don't talk to anybody, do it first. until the Son of Man is risen from the dead. So I want to thank you all for your attention and for making this a very nice shared experience. Of course, I'm very grateful to Father John for inviting me to share with you and

[50:32]

I asked forgiveness for my shortcomings. After ten lectures like that, one always says, oh, I could have done this better, I could have done that better, but I did my best and that's all I can do. And also for me, it really was a wonderful experience of being with you in community. Because no matter how stretched my stability was locally, in my heart of hearts, I really I feel always like really belonging, and that is not my merit, but that of the community, that you have supported me with your trust, even though maybe it wasn't always so clear what I was doing. So many thanks, and we thank God, and we pray once more this old form of the doxology together, which sums it all up.

[51:51]

Glory be to the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning. This now and ever shall be world without end. Amen. And of course when we pray through the sun, this means you. The glory of God is the human being for your lives. We are now off the hook. So, and I still have a little bookmark for each one of you to remember this retreat and to hope, pray for me. And I would like to give it to you with a hug. Thank you very much. Thank you so much.

[52:53]

There's something in there. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, not weak. Yeah. Are you still in Taj Mahal? Yeah, I was one time. I was one time. I still don't understand. It must be strong on me.

[53:54]

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