"Feed my Lambs - Tend my sheep"
Matthew 16: 13-19
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/062925-Mass.cfm
O God, who on the Solemnity of the Apostles Peter and Paul
give us the noble and holy joy of this day,
grant that your Church may in all things follow the teaching
of those through whom she received the beginnings of right religion.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever.
(Collect of Mass)
Seeking heroes and inspirational figures in our day
and age is somewhat dauting. However, a look to our faith provides us thousands
of examples from those who lived the faith in heroic Christian ways: our
Saints. Each year we call to mind this
cast of thousands of Christians, of all walks of life, cultures, centuries, to
be our heavenly cheerleaders. However, might there be some standouts among the
holy ones?
This Sunday we celebrate the Solemnity of Sts. Peter
and Paul. June 29th is
normally the day of this memorial, and it just happens to fall on a Sunday this
year, these two “super Apostles,” along with Jesus, were the founders of the
Christian faith. Obviously Christianity is named after Jesus the Christ
himself, and no one is equal to the Son of God, but Jesus chose two who would
act in his name and carry the banner of the good news of salvation to Jews and
Gentiles well beyond the limited confines of the land of Israel.
However, the two could not be more unlike each other.
Peter, the impulsive fisherman from Galilee, the “rock” which Jesus chose to
lead his Church, only to see him deny that he even knew our Lord at the time of
his arrest.
Paul, the learned Pharisee, immersed in all things
Jewish, in the sacred Law, and a Roman citizen who was chosen and singularly
focused on arresting and stamping out the followers of Jesus of Nazareth,
considered to be a heretical sect and a danger to Judaism as a whole. Once chosen by our Lord, however, their lives
radically changed from whatever direction they imagined they would go.
In our readings we marvel at Peter’s angelic removal
from prison. How both God and the community were directly instrumental in
bringing that about.
Also, the wonders of Peter’s preaching and faith in
the first reading for the Vigil Mass where at the very command of Peter, in
Jesus’ name, a man is healed. God worked
great wonders through this first leader of the Christian Church.
Paul is an entirely different story. Off he goes to Damascus to round up
Christians, throw them in jail, and beyond that who knows what.
Paul encounters the risen Christ along the way and
spends the next few years in a new faith formation and personal conversion
process. As much as he was against early Christians, he now becomes a leader of
the early Church, founding Christian communities throughout the ancient Mediterranean
populations. Three missionary journeys
and covering thousands of miles brings his ultimately to Rome, along with
Peter, to make the ultimate sacrifice for the Lord. They followed not their own desires but they
sought out the will of God and so the Church was established forever on a firm
foundation, on that of Christ himself. They
certainly earned the title “Super Apostles.”
Therefore, we find that a reaching out, the whole
missionary spirit, is the personality, the character of the Christian
faith. As both Peter and Paul never
remained fixed or even safe in their missionary activities, so too must we be
willing to embrace some level of sacrifice, courage, boldness and conviction in
the Christian life. We need to ask the
Holy Spirit to enlighten us and grant us these important skills and
virtues. My both Peter and Paul be for us
giants among those figures, those heroes, that we are graced to emulate.
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