Panel: INTERFAITH DIALOGUE AND TRANSFORMATION



63.2 - THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTOLOGY AFTER INTERFAITH DIALOGUE

AUTHORS:
Admirand P. (Dublin City University ~ Dublin ~ Ireland)
Text:
The transfiguration of Christ (Mark 9:2-13; Matthew 17:1-13; Luke 9:28-36) and the sacramental belief in transubstantiation both speak of change and stability. In the transfiguration in Mark's gospel, we read: "And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling bright, such as no one on earth could brighten them." While the disciples were said to be "terrified" by this illumination, the voice of God, as at the baptism of Jesus and later through the mouth of the Roman Centurion at the cross speak, of the sonship of Jesus. Changed, but not changed, or the change still results in a core identity, an element of sameness. In the Catholic belief of transubstantiation, the bread and wine consecrated by a priest at mass, becomes the body and blood of Christ. As 1413 in the Catholic Catechism states: "Under the consecrated species of bread and wine Christ himself, living and glorious, is present in a true, real, and substantial manner: his Body and his Blood, with his soul and his divinity." In this paper, I want to argue that the interfaith encounter, and often embrace and even critique, of the Christian belief of Christ, is another kind of transformation that is both miraculous and sacramental, if we take the two examples above. And like those two examples, the transformation that occurs can overpower what had been before. The Jesus on the way up the high mountain and the Christ who returns with the disciples (though the act is not narrated) is still, in many ways, the same—but yet also clearly perceived as (or become) radically different. For Catholics, the bread and wine offer a distinctive but parallel meditation. Taking a Buddhist, Jewish, and Muslim interpretation, embrace, or critique of Christology, I will endeavor to see how this interfaith, transformed Christology is still, as it were, my Jesus, even as these interfaith words will encourage, if not demand, a transformation within.