On the feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord, with the blessing of His Eminence Metropolitan Vladimir, the First Hierarch of the Orthodox Church of Moldova, His Grace Siluan, Bishop of Orhei, Metropolitan Vicar, celebrated the Holy and Divine Liturgy at the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Nativity of the Lord in Chisinau. The bishop was assisted at the service by a group of clergy of the Cathedral.
The Transfiguration of our Lord Jesus Christ is the last feast directly linked to the person of the Savior Christ, celebrated by the Church throughout a liturgical year. It falls within the Lent appointed for the feast of the commemoration of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and her bodily ascension into heaven. The event is recounted by three of the four evangelists (Matthew 17:1-8, Mark 9:2-8 and Luke 9:28-36), and the time was to be celebrated in March, depending on the date of the Easter feast. In order not to overlap with the beginning of Great Lent, the Fathers decided to celebrate it on August 6/19, 40 days before the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, which recalls and actualizes the sufferings and death on the Cross of our Savior Jesus Christ.
Through the Transfiguration before the disciples, Christ reveals to us the destiny of each one of us, willed by God from eternity, our elevation from image to likeness, our redemption.
“The Transfiguration of the Lord is the firm foundation of our hope in the change of our whole life, now full of toil, pain, fear, into incorrupt life in God. But this ascent to the high mountain (Mt. 17:1; Mk. 9:2) of the Transfiguration is accompanied by great effort,” says Father Sophrony Sakharov.
We are all called to this effort, to this deed, but also to the happiness of union with God. And for this we need to be born again spiritually, to “change our faces”, for God is light and there is no darkness in Him (1 Jn 1:5), light cannot have fellowship with darkness, and God will not be able to receive our soul darkened by sin as it is now.
Source: https://manastireacurchi.md/