Throughout the season of Lent, we’re featuring the Millennial Lenten Reflection Series, co-sponsored by Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and Franciscan Mission Service. Each small reflection will be written by a young person, focusing on that day’s Mass reading. You can sign up for the series here.

In today’s readings, we read two seemingly competing stories of God with God speaking of both violence and blessing on the mountaintop: God tests Abraham by asking him to kill his only son to test his love for Him in the first reading, and the Transfiguration of Jesus in front of Peter, James, and John is accompanied by God’s voice saying, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him” in the Gospel.

By all accounts, both the death of Jesus and the call for Abraham to sacrifice his son are unjust. After all, they did nothing wrong! So why did God ask for it?

The confusion arises from a belief that what is loved should be protected and secured. God thinks differently. For Him, that which is loved, like the Eucharist, is meant to be blessed and shared with others.

The season of Lent and meditation on the cross reminds us that God’s justice is beyond human justice. God does not desire to make all things fair or equal, but to draw all people to Himself and that path always leads through the love of the cross.

Jonathan Lewis is the Director of Young Adult Ministry for the Archdiocese of Washington