Today’s readings: Job 38:1, 8-11; Ps 107:23-31; 2 Cor 5:14-17; 1Mk 4:35-41

Last March, McKinsey and Company published previsions of when the COVID-19 pandemic, depending on “crucial variables”, will effectively pass over, enabling the world to transition to “normalcy”. Last year, Pope Francis too proactively set up an expert commission to map out, in collaboration with international organisations, plans for a better world beyond COVID-19. Also last week, during the local Church’s ongoing formation programme for priests, various academics and experts presented the results of surveys on the impact of COVID-19, prognosticating what the future might be.

To be truthful, one must admit that certain conclusions and observations have been written on the wall for years. COVID-19, at last, presented unalienable facts to those who still chose to live in denial instead of facing the truth of the signs of times, calling us to willingly pass through a radical process of transformation.

Jesus’s request to his disciples – “Let us pass over to the other side” – is godsend in these present times of change. As we are compelled to proactively look to the future, it is worth pondering, in the light of faith, on Jesus’s invitation, in today’s Gospel, to pass over. For the disciple this implies a readiness to “leave behind the crowd” and “take him along”. The passing over (diérchomai) during the night from one shore to another, over the waters, has paschal connotations and undertones.

The Jewish pesah was first and foremost the angel of death’s passing over the homes of the faithful as well as the crossing over to the other shore from the slavery of Egypt to the freedom of the desert towards the promised land. Jesus’s own pascha then, is the mystery of his passing over from death to life.

Here, radical transformations take place in the lives of those who willingly “pass over to the other side”. The movement is not merely indicative of change, as everything is subject to change, and this independently of our willingness to accept or to resist it: Everything is marked by the law of change, hence everything is impermanent. In this light, Jesus’s invitation takes us to another level, that of willingly embracing change in such a way as to grasp the opportunity to go through it and be radically transformed by it.

The Jewish Passover transformed the Hebrews from slaves to a free people; the Passover of Jesus transformed him from a dead man to “a life-giving spirit” (1 Cor 15:45). The Christian faithful, in virtue of their baptismal immersion, are defined by this powerful dynamic of transformation in Christ who is always ahead of us, permanently inviting us to pass over and renew ourselves. It is really sad to see that, as Christians, we tend to resist change more often than we would like to admit, only to realise that we desist from allowing God to radically transform us, our vision, structures, and our way of doing things.

On the boat passing over in a “furious squall”, as the Twelve face their inner fears and anxieties, Jesus sleeps in the stern, as in the midst of inevitable change, each and everyone has to ultimately shoulder responsibility for their own transformation. No one can shoulder it for us, as we are expected to keep watch and be proactively prepared for what is to come.

Jesus points to the virtue of faith as the pillar of inner “stillness” which enables us to see clearly and to willingly go through a process of “renewal which cannot be deferred” (Evangelii Gaudium, 27-33). Then, “let us pass over”.